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diff --git a/25570-0.txt b/25570-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a3ee4ec --- /dev/null +++ b/25570-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,24390 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Manxman, by Hall Caine + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Manxman + A Novel - 1895 + +Author: Hall Caine + +Release Date: May 23, 2008 [EBook #25570] +Last Updated: March 8, 2018 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MANXMAN *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + +THE MANXMAN + +A NOVEL + +By Hall Caine + + +SECOND EDITION + +APPLETON AND COMPANY - 1894 + + + + +THE MANXMAN. + + + + +PART I. BOYS TOGETHER. + + + + +I. + +Old Deemster Christian of Ballawhaine was a hard man--hard on the +outside, at all events. They called him Iron Christian, and people said, +“Don't turn that iron hand against you.” Yet his character was stamped +with nobleness as well as strength. He was not a man of icy nature, but +he loved to gather icicles about him. There was fire enough underneath, +at which he warmed his old heart when alone, but he liked the air to +be congealed about his face. He was a man of a closed soul. One had to +wrench open the dark chamber where he kept his feelings; but the man who +had done that had uncovered his nakedness, and he cut him off for ever. +That was how it happened with his son, the father of Philip. + +He had two sons; the elder was an impetuous creature, a fiery spirit, +one of the masterful souls who want the restraint of the curb if they +are not to hurry headlong into the abyss. Old Deemster Christian had +called this boy Thomas Wilson, after the serene saint who had once +been Bishop of Man. He was intended, however, for the law, not for +the Church. The office of Deemster never has been and never can be +hereditary; yet the Christians of Ballawhaine had been Deemsters through +six generations, and old Iron Christian expected that Thomas Wilson +Christian would succeed him. But there was enough uncertainty about the +succession to make merit of more value than precedent in the selection, +and so the old man had brought up his son to the English bar, and +afterwards called him to practise in the Manx one. The young fellow had +not altogether rewarded his father's endeavours. During his residence +in England, he had acquired certain modern doctrines which were highly +obnoxious to the old Deemster. New views on property, new ideas +about woman and marriage, new theories concerning religion (always +re-christened superstition), the usual barnacles of young vessels fresh +from unknown waters; but the old man was no shipwright in harbour who +has learnt the art of removing them without injury to the hull. The +Deemster knew these notions when he met with them in the English +newspapers. There was something awesome in their effect on his +stay-at-home imagination, as of vices confusing and difficult to true +men that walk steadily; but, above all, very far off, over the mountains +and across the sea, like distant cities of Sodom, only waiting for +Sodom's doom. And yet, lo! here they were in a twinkling, shunted and +shot into his own house and his own stackyard. + +“I suppose now,” he said, with a knowing look, “you think Jack as good +as his master?” + +“No, sir,” said his son gravely; “generally much better.” + +Iron Christian altered his will. To his elder son he left only a +life-interest in Ballawhaine. “That boy will be doing something,” he +said, and thus he guarded against consequences. He could not help it; he +was ashamed, but he could not conquer his shame--the fiery old man began +to nurse a grievance against his son. + +The two sons of the Deemster were like the inside and outside of a bowl, +and that bowl was the Deemster himself. If Thomas Wilson the elder +had his father's inside fire and softness, Peter, the younger, had his +father's outside ice and iron. Peter was little and almost misshapen, +with a pair of shoulders that seemed to be trying to meet over a hollow +chest and limbs that splayed away into vacancy. And if Nature had been +grudging with him, his father was not more kind. He had been brought up +to no profession, and his expectations were limited to a yearly charge +out of his brother's property. His talk was bitter, his voice cold, +he laughed little, and had never been known to cry. He had many things +against him. + +Besides these sons, Deemster Christian had a girl in his household, but +to his own consciousness the fact was only a kind of peradventure. She +was his niece, the child of his only brother, who had died in early +manhood. Her name was Ann Charlotte de la Tremouille, called after +the lady of Rushen, for the family of Christian had their share of the +heroic that is in all men. She had fine eyes, a weak mouth, and great +timidity. Gentle airs floated always about her, and a sort of nervous +brightness twinkled over her, as of a glen with the sun flickering +through. Her mother died when she was a child of twelve, and in the +house of her uncle and her cousins she had been brought up among men and +boys. + +One day Peter drew the Deemster aside and told him (with expressions +of shame, interlarded with praises of his own acuteness) a story of his +brother. It was about a girl. Her name was Mona Crellin; she lived on +the hill at Ballure House, half a mile south of Ramsey, and was +daughter of a man called Billy Ballure, a retired sea-captain, and +hail-fellow-well-met with all the jovial spirits of the town. + +There was much noise and outcry, and old Iron sent for his son. + +“What's this I hear?” he cried, looking him down. “A woman? So that's +what your fine learning comes to, eh? Take care, sir! take care! No son +of mine shall disgrace himself. The day he does that he will be put to +the door.” + +Thomas held himself in with a great effort. + +“Disgrace?” he said. “What disgrace, sir, if you please?” + +“What disgrace, sir?” repeated the Deemster, mocking his son in a +mincing treble. Then he roared, “Behaving dishonourably to a poor +girl--that what's disgrace, sir! Isn't it enough? eh? eh?” + +“More than enough,” said the young man. “But who is doing it? I'm not.” + +“Then you're doing worse. _Did_ I say worse? Of course I said worse. +Worse, sir, worse! Do you hear me? Worse! You are trapsing around +Ballure, and letting that poor girl take notions. I'll have no more +of it. Is this what I sent you to England for? Aren't you ashamed of +yourself? Keep your place, sir; keep your place. A poor girl's a poor +girl, and a Deemster's a Deemster.” + +“Yes, sir,” said Thomas, suddenly firing up, “and a man's a man. As for +the shame, I need be ashamed of nothing that is not shameful; and the +best proof I can give you that I mean no dishonour by the girl is that I +intend to marry her.” + +“What? You intend to--what? Did I hear----” + +The old Deemster turned his good ear towards his son's face, and the +young man repeated his threat. Never fear! No poor girl should be misled +by him. He was above all foolish conventions. + +Old Iron Christian was dumbfounded. He gasped, he stared, he stammered, +and then fell on his son with hot reproaches. + +“What? Your wife? Wife? That trollop!--that minx! that--and daughter of +that sot, too, that old rip, that rowdy blatherskite--that----And my +own son is to lift his hand to cut his throat! Yes, sir, cut his +throat----And I am to stand by! No, no! I say no, sir, no!” + +The young man made some further protest, but it was lost in his father's +clamour. + +“You will, though? You will? Then your hat is your house, sir. Take to +it--take to it!” + +“No need to tell me twice, father.” + +“Away then--away to your woman--your jade! God, keep my hands off him!” + +The old man lifted his clenched fist, but his son had flung out of the +room. It was not the Deemster only who feared he might lay hands on his +own flesh and blood. + +“Stop! come back, you dog! Listen! I've not done yet. Stop! you +hotheaded rascal, stop! Can't you hear a man out then? Come back! Thomas +Wilson, come back, sir! Thomas! Thomas! Tom! Where is he? Where's the +boy?” + +Old Iron Christian had made after his son bareheaded down to the road, +shouting his name in a broken roar, but the young man was gone. Then +he went back slowly, his grey hair playing in the wind. He was all iron +outside, but all father within. + +That day the Deemster altered his will a second time, and his elder son +was disinherited. + + + + +II. + +Peter succeeded in due course to the estate of Ballawhaine, but he was +not a lawyer, and the line of the Deemsters Christian was broken. + +Meantime Thomas Wilson Christian had been married to Mona Crellin +without delay. He loved her, but he had been afraid of her ignorance, +afraid also (notwithstanding his principles) of the difference in their +social rank, and had half intended to give her up when his father's +reproaches had come to fire his anger and to spur his courage. As +soon as she became his wife he realised the price he had paid for her. +Happiness could not come of such a beginning. He had broken every tie +in making the one which brought him down. The rich disowned him, and the +poor lost respect for him. + +“It's positively indecent,” said one. “It's potatoes marrying herrings,” + said another. It was little better than hunger marrying thirst. + +In the general downfall of his fame his profession failed him. He lost +heart and ambition. His philosophy did not stand him in good stead, for +it had no value in the market to which he brought it. Thus, day by day, +he sank deeper into the ooze of a wrecked and wasted life. + +The wife did not turn out well. She was a fretful person, with a good +face, a bad shape, a vacant mind, and a great deal of vanity. She +had liked her husband a little as a lover, but when she saw that her +marriage brought her nobody's envy, she fell into a long fit of the +vapours. Eventually she made herself believe that she was an ill-used +person. She never ceased to complain of her fate. Everybody treated her +as if she had laid plans for her husband's ruin. + +The husband continued to love her, but little by little he grew to +despise her also. When he made his first plunge, he had prided himself +on indulging an heroic impulse. He was not going to deliver a good woman +to dishonour because she seemed to be an obstacle to his success. But +she had never realised his sacrifice. She did not appear to understand +that he might have been a great man in the island, but that love and +honour had held him back. Her ignorance was pitiful, and he was ashamed +of it. In earning the contempt of others he had not saved himself from +self-contempt. + +The old sailor died suddenly in a fit of drunkenness at a fair, and +husband and wife came into possession of his house and property at +Ballure. This did not improve the relations between them. The woman +perceived that their positions were reversed. She was the bread-bringer +now. One day, at a slight that her husband's people had put upon her +in the street, she reminded him, in order to re-establish her wounded +vanity, that but for her and hers he would not have so much as a roof to +cover him. + +Yet the man continued to love her in spite of all. And she was not +at first a degraded being. At times she was bright and cheerful, and, +except in the worst spells of her vapours, she was a brisk and busy +woman. The house was sweet and homely. There was only one thing to drive +him away from it, but that was the greatest thing of all. Nevertheless +they had their cheerful hours together. + +A child was born, a boy, and they called him Philip. He was the +beginning of the end between them; the iron stay that held them together +and yet apart. The father remembered his misfortunes in the presence +of his son, and the mother was stung afresh by the recollection of +disappointed hopes. The boy was the true heir of Ballawhaine, but the +inheritance was lost to him by his father's fault and he had nothing. + +Philip grew to be a winsome lad. There was something sweet and amiable +and big-hearted, and even almost great, in him. One day the father +sat in the garden by the mighty fuchsia-tree that grows on the lawn, +watching his little fair-haired son play at marbles on the path with two +big lads whom he had enticed out of the road, and another more familiar +playmate--the little barefooted boy Peter, from the cottage by the +water-trough. At first Philip lost, and with grunts of satisfaction +the big ones promptly pocketed their gains. Then Philip won, and little +curly Peter was stripped naked, and his lip began to fall. At that +Philip paused, held his head aside, and considered, and then said quite +briskly, “Peter hadn't a fair chance that time--here, let's give him +another go.” + +The father's throat swelled, and he went indoors to the mother and said, +“I think--perhaps I'm to blame--but somehow I think our boy isn't +like other boys. What do you say? Foolish? May be so, may be so! No +difference? Well, no--no!” + +But deep down in the secret place of his heart, Thomas Wilson Christian, +broken man, uprooted tree, wrecked craft in the mud and slime, began to +cherish a fond idea. The son would regain all that his father had lost! +He had gifts, and he should be brought up to the law; a large nature, +and he should be helped to develop it; a fine face which all must +love, a sense of justice, and a great wealth of the power of radiating +happiness. Deemster? Why not? Ballawhaine? Who could tell? The biggest, +noblest, greatest of all Manxmen! God knows! + +Only--only he must be taught to fly from his father's dangers. Love? +Then let him love where he can also respect--but never outside his own +sphere. The island was too little for that. To love and to despise was +to suffer the torments of the damned. + +Nourishing these dreams, the poor man began to be tortured by every +caress the mother gave her son, and irritated by every word she spoke to +him. Her grammar was good enough for himself, and the exuberant caresses +of her maudlin moods were even sometimes pleasant, but the boy must be +degraded by neither. + +The woman did not reach to these high thoughts, but she was not slow to +interpret the casual byplay in which they found expression. Her husband +was taiching her son to dis-respeck her. She wouldn't have thought it +of him--she wouldn't really. But it was always the way when a +plain practical woman married on the quality. Imperence and +dis-respeck--that's the capers! Imperence and disrespeck from the +ones that's doing nothing and behoulden to you for everything. It was +shocking! It was disthressing! + +In such outbursts would her jealousy taunt him with his poverty, revile +him for his idleness, and square accounts with him for the manifest +preference of the boy. He could bear them with patience when they were +alone, but in Philip's presence they were as gall and wormwood, and +whips and scorpions. + +“Go, my lad, go,” he would sometimes whimper, and hustle the boy out of +the way. + +“No,” the woman would cry, “stop and see the man your father is.” + +And the father would mutter, “He might see the woman his mother is as +well.” + +But when she had pinned them together, and the boy had to hear her out, +the man would drop his forehead on the table and break into groans and +tears. Then the woman would change quite suddenly, and put her arms +about him and kiss him and weep over him. He could defend himself from +neither her insults nor her embraces. In spite of everything he loved +her. That was where the bitterness of the evil lay. But for the love he +bore her, he might have got her off his back and been his own man once +more. He would make peace with her and kiss her again, and they would +both kiss the boy, and be tender, and even cheerful. + +Philip was still a child, but he saw the relations of his parents, and +in his own way he understood everything. He loved his father best, but +he did not hate his mother. She was nearly always affectionate, though +often jealous of the father's greater love and care for him, and +sometimes irritable from that cause alone. But the frequent broils +between them were like blows that left scars on his body. He slept in a +cot in the same room, and he would cover up his head in the bedclothes +at night with a feeling of fear and physical pain. + +A man cannot fight against himself for long. That deadly enemy is +certain to slay. When Philip was six years old his father lay sick of +his last sickness. The wife had fallen into habits of intemperance by +this time, and stage by stage she had descended to the condition of an +utterly degraded woman. There was something to excuse her. She had been +disappointed in the great stakes of life; she had earned disgrace +where she had looked for admiration. She was vain, and could not bear +misfortune; and she had no deep well of love from which to drink when +the fount of her pride ran dry. If her husband had indulged her with a +little pity, everything might have gone along more easily. But he had +only loved her and been ashamed. And now that he lay near to his death, +the love began to ebb and the shame to deepen into dread. + +He slept little at night, and as often as he closed his eyes certain +voices of mocking and reproach seemed to be constantly humming in his +ears. + +“Your son!” they would cry. “What is to become of him? Your dreams! +Your great dreams! Deemster! Ballawhaine! God knows what! You are +leaving the boy; who is to bring him up? His mother? Think of it!” + +At last a ray of pale sunshine broke on the sleepless wrestler with the +night, and he became almost happy. “I'll speak to the boy,” he thought. +“I will tell him my own history, concealing nothing. Yes, I will tell +him of my own father also, God rest him, the stern old man--severe, yet +just.” + +An opportunity soon befell. It was late at night--very late. The woman +was sleeping off a bout of intemperance somewhere below; and the boy, +with the innocence and ignorance of his years in all that the solemn +time foreboded, was bustling about the room with mighty eagerness, +because he knew that he ought to be in bed. + +“I'm staying up to intend on you, father,” said the boy. + +The father answered with a sigh. + +“Don't you asturb yourself, father. I'll intend on you.” + +The father's sigh deepened to a moan. + +“If you want anything 'aticular, just call me; d'ye see, father?” + +And away went the boy like a gleam of light. Presently he came back, +leaping like the dawn. He was carrying, insecurely, a jug of poppy-head +and camomile, which had been prescribed as a lotion. + +“Poppy heads, father! Poppy-heads is good, I can tell ye.” + +“Why arn't you in bed, child?” said the father. “You must be tired.” + +“No, I'm not tired, father. I was just feeling a bit of tired, and then +I took a smell of poppy-heads and away went the tiredness to Jericho. +They _is_ good.” + +The little white head was glinting off again when the father called it +back. + +“Come here, my boy.” The child went up to the bedside, and the father +ran his fingers lovingly through the long fair hair. + +“Do you think, Philip, that twenty, thirty, forty years hence, when you +are a man--aye, a big man, little one--do you think you will remember +what I shall say to you now?” + +“Why, yes, father, if it's anything 'aticular, and if it isn't you can +amind me of it, can't you, father?” + +The father shook his head. “I shall not be here then, my boy. I am going +away----” + +“Going away, father? May I come too?” + +“Ah! I wish you could, little one. Yes, truly I almost wish you could.” + +“Then you'll let me go with you, father! Oh, I _am_ glad, father.” And +the boy began to caper and dance, to go down on all fours, and leap +about the floor like a frog. + +The father fell back on his pillow with a heaving breast. Vain! vain! +What was the use of speaking? The child's outlook was life; his own was +death; they had no common ground; they spoke different tongues. And, +after all, how could he suffer the sweet innocence of the child's soul +to look down into the stained and scarred chamber of his ruined heart? + +“You don't understand me, Philip. I mean that I am going--to die. Yes, +darling, and, only that I am leaving you behind, I should be glad to go. +My life has been wasted, Philip. In the time to come, when men speak +of your father, you will be ashamed. Perhaps you will not remember then +that whatever he was he was a good father to you, for at least he loved +you dearly. Well, I must needs bow to the will of God, but if I could +only hope that you would live to restore my name when I am gone.... +Philip, are you--don't cry, my darling. There, there, kiss me. We'll +say no more about it then. Perhaps it's not true, although father tolded +you? Well, perhaps not. And now undress and slip into bed before mother +comes. See, there's your night-dress at the foot of the crib. Wants some +buttons, does it? Never mind--in with you--that's a boy.” + +Impossible, impossible! And perhaps unnecessary. Who should say? Young +as the child was, he might never forget what he had seen and heard. Some +day it must have its meaning for him. Thus the father comforted +himself. Those jangling quarrels which had often scorched his brain like +iron--the memory of their abject scenes came to him then, with a sort of +bleeding solace! + +Meanwhile, with little catching sobs, which he struggled to repress, the +boy lay down in his crib. When half-way gone towards the mists of the +land of sleep, he started up suddenly, and called “Good night, father,” + and his father answered him “Good night.” + +Towards three o'clock the next morning there was great commotion in the +house. The servant was scurrying up and downstairs, and the mistress, +wringing her hands, was tramping to and fro in the sick-room, crying in +a tone of astonishment, as if the thought had stolen upon her unawares, +“Why, he's going! How didn't somebody tell me before?” + +The eyes of the sinking man were on the crib. “Philip,” he faltered. +They lifted the boy out of his bed, and brought him in his night-dress +to his father's side; and the father twisted about and took him into his +arms, still half asleep and yawning. Then the mother, recovering from +the stupidity of her surprise, broke into paroxysms of weeping, and fell +over her husband's breast and kissed and kissed him. + +For once her kisses had no response. The man was dying miserably, for he +was thinking of her and of the boy. Sometimes he babbled over Philip in +a soft, inarticulate gurgle; sometimes he looked up at his wife's face +with a stony stare, and then he clung the closer to the boy, as if he +would never let him go. The dark hour came, and still he held the boy in +his arms. They had to release the child at last from his father's dying +grip. + +The dead of the night was gone by this time, and the day was at the +point of dawn; the sparrows in the eaves were twittering, and the tide, +which was at its lowest ebb, was heaving on the sand far out in the bay +with the sound as of a rookery awakening. Philip remembered afterwards +that his mother cried so much that he was afraid, and that when he +had been dressed she took him downstairs, where they all ate breakfast +together, with the sun shining through the blinds. + +The mother did not live to overshadow her son's life. Sinking yet lower +in habits of intemperance, she stayed indoors from week-end to week-end, +seated herself like a weeping willow by the fireside, and drank and +drank. Her excesses led to delusions. She saw ghosts perpetually. To +avoid such of them as haunted the death-room of her husband, she had +a bed made up on a couch in the parlour, and one morning she was found +face downwards stretched out beside it on the floor. + +Then Philip's father's cousin, always called his Aunty Nan, came to +Ballure House to bring him up. His father had been her favourite cousin, +and, in spite of all that had happened, he had been her lifelong hero +also. A deep and secret tenderness, too timid to be quite aware of +itself, had been lying in ambush in her heart through all the years +of his miserable life with Mona. At the death of the old Deemster, her +other cousin, Peter, had married and cast her off. But she was always +one of those woodland herbs which are said to give out their sweetest +fragrance after they have been trodden on and crushed. Philip's father +had been her hero, her lost one and her love, and Philip was his +father's son. + + + + +III. + +Little curly Pete, with the broad, bare feet, the tousled black head, +the jacket half way up his back like a waistcoat with sleeves, and the +hole in his trousers where the tail of his shirt should have been, was +Peter Quilliam, and he was the natural son of Peter Christian. In the +days when that punctilious worthy set himself to observe the doings of +his elder brother at Ballure, he found it convenient to make an outwork +of the hedge in front of the thatched house that stood nearest. Two +persons lived in the cottage, father and daughter--Tom Quilliam, usually +called Black Tom, and Bridget Quilliam, getting the name of Bridget +Black Tom. + +The man was a short, gross creature, with an enormous head and a big, +open mouth, showing broken teeth that were black with the juice of +tobacco. The girl was by common judgment and report a gawk--a great, +slow-eyed, comely-looking, comfortable, easy-going gawk. Black Tom was +a thatcher, and with his hair poking its way through the holes in his +straw hat, he tramped the island in pursuit of his calling. This kept +him from home for days together, and in that fact Peter Christian, while +shadowing the morality of his brother, found his own opportunity. + +When the child was born, neither the thatcher nor his daughter attempted +to father it. Peter Christian paid twenty pounds to the one and eighty +to the other in Manx pound-notes, the boys daubed their door to show +that the house was dishonoured, and that was the end of everything. + +The girl went through her “censures” silently, or with only one comment. +She had borrowed the sheet in which she appeared in church from Miss +Christian of Ballawhaine, and when she took it back, the good soul of +the sweet lady thought to improve the occasion. + +“I was wondering, Bridget,” she said gravely, “what you were thinking of +when you stood with Bella and Liza before the congregation last Sunday +morning”--two other Magda-lenes had done penance by Bridget's side. + +“'Deed, mistress,” said the girl, “I was thinkin' there wasn't a sheet +at one of them to match mine for whiteness. I'd 'a been ashamed to be +seen in the like of theirs.” + +Bridget may have been a gawk, but she did two things which were not +gawkish. Putting the eighty greasy notes into the foot of an old +stocking, she sewed them up in the ticking of her bed, and then +christened her baby Peter. The money was for the child if she should not +live to rear him, and the name was her way of saying that a man's son +was his son in spite of law or devil. + +After that she kept both herself and her child by day labour in the +fields, weeding and sowing potatoes, and following at the tail of the +reapers, for sixpence a day dry days, and fourpence all weathers. She +might have badgered the heir of Ballawhaine, but she never did so. That +person came into his inheritance, got himself elected member for Ramsey +in the House of Keys, married Nessy Taubman, daughter of the rich +brewer, and became the father of another son. Such were the doings +in the big house down in the valley, while up in the thatched cottage +behind the water-trough, on potatoes and herrings and barley bonnag, +lived Bridget and her little Pete. + +Pete's earliest recollections were of a boy who lived at the beautiful +white house with the big fuchsia, by the turn of the road over the +bridge that crossed the glen. This was Philip Christian, half a year +older than himself, although several inches shorter, with long yellow +hair and rosy cheeks, and dressed in a velvet suit of knickerbockers. +Pete worshipped him in his simple way, hung about him, fetched and +carried for him, and looked up to him as a marvel of wisdom and goodness +and pluck. + +His first memory of Philip was of sleeping with him, snuggled up by his +side in the dark, hushed and still in a narrow bed with iron ends to it, +and of leaping up in the morning and laughing. Philip's father--a +tall, white gentleman, who never laughed at all, and only smiled +sometimes--had found him in the road in the evening waiting for his +mother to come home from the fields, that he might light the fire in the +cottage, and running about in the meantime to keep himself warm, and not +too hungry. + +His second memory was of Philip guiding him round the drawing-room (over +thick carpets, on which his bare feet made no noise), and showing him +the pictures on the walls, and telling him what they meant. One +(an engraving of St. John, with a death's-head and a crucifix) was, +according to this grim and veracious guide, a picture of a brigand who +killed his victims, and always skinned their skulls with a cross-handled +dagger. After that his memories of Philip and himself were as two gleams +of sunshine which mingle and become one. + +Philip was a great reader of noble histories. He found them, frayed +and tattered, at the bottom of a trunk that had tin corners and two +padlocks, and stood in the room looking towards the harbour where his +mother's father, the old sailor, had slept. One of them was his special +favourite, and he used to read it aloud to Pete. It told of the doings +of the Carrasdhoo men. They were a bold band of desperadoes, the terror +of all the island. Sometimes they worked in the fields at ploughing, and +reaping, and stacking, the same as common practical men; and sometimes +they lived in houses, just like the house by the water-trough. But when +the wind was rising in the nor-nor-west, and there was a taste of the +brine on your lips, they would be up, and say, “The sea's calling us--we +must be going.” Then they would live in rocky caves of the coast where +nobody could reach them, and there would be fires lit at night in +tar-barrels, and shouting, and singing, and carousing; and after that +there would be ships' rudders, and figure heads, and masts coming up +with the tide, and sometimes dead bodies on the beach of sailors they +had drowned--only foreign ones though--hundreds and tons of them. But +that was long ago, the Carrasdhoo men were dead, and the glory of their +day was departed. + +One quiet evening, after an awesome reading of this brave history, +Philip, sitting on his haunches at the gable, with Pete like another +white frog beside him, said quite suddenly, “Hush! What's that?” + +“I wonder,” said Pete. + +There was never a sound in the air above the rustle of a leaf, and +Pete's imagination could carry him no further. + +“Pete,” said Philip, with awful gravity, “the sea's calling me.” + +“And me,” said Pete solemnly. + +Early that night the two lads were down at the most desolate part of +Port Mooar, in a cave under the scraggy black rocks of Gobny-Garvain, +kindling a fire of gorse and turf inside the remains of a broken barrel. + +“See that tremendous sharp rock below low water?” said Philip. + +“Don't I, though?” said Pete. + +There was never a rock the size of a currycomb between them and the line +of the sky. + +“That's what we call a reef,” said Philip. “Wait a bit and you'll see +the ships go splitting on top of it like--like----” + +“Like a tay-pot,” said Pete. + +“We'll save the women, though,” said Philip. “Shall we save the women, +Pete? We always do.” + +“Aw, yes, the women--and the boys,” said Pete thoughtfully. + +Philip had his doubts about the boys, but he would not quarrel. It +was nearly dark, and growing very cold. The lads croodled down by the +crackling blaze, and tried to forget that they had forgotten tea-time. + +“We never has to mind a bit of hungry,” said Philip stoutly. + +“Never a ha'p'orth,” said Pete. + +“Only when the job's done we have hams and flitches and things for +supper.” + +“Aw, yes, ateing and drinking to the full.” + +“Rum, Pete, we always drinks rum.” + +“We has to,” said Pete. + +“None of your tea,” said Philip. + +“Coorse not, none of your ould grannie's two-penny tay,” said Pete. + +It was quite dark by this time, and the tide was rising rapidly. +There was not a star in the sky, and not a light on the sea except +the revolving light of the lightship far a Way. The boys crept closer +together and began to think of home. Philip remembered Aunty Nan. When +he had stolen away on hands and knees under the parlour window she had +been sewing at his new check night-shirt. A night-shirt for a Carrasdhoo +man had seemed to be ridiculous then; but where was Aunty Nannie now? +Pete remembered his mother--she would be racing round the houses and +crying; and he had visions of Black Tom--he would be racing round also +and swearing. + +“Shouldn't we sing something, Phil?” said Pete, with a gurgle in his +throat. + +“Sing!” said Philip, with as much scorn as he could summon, “and give +them warning we're watching for them! Well, you _are_ a pretty, Mr. +Pete! But just you wait till the ships goes wrecking on the rocks--I +mean the reefs--and the dead men's coming up like corks--hundreds and +ninety and dozens of them; my jove! yes, then you'll hear me singing.” + +The darkness deepened, and the voice of the sea began to moan through +the back of the cave, the gorse crackled no longer, and the turf burned +in a dull red glow. Night with its awfulness had come down, and the boys +were cut off from everything. + +“They don't seem to be coming--not yet,” said Philip, in a husky +whisper. + +“Maybe it's the same as fishing,” said Pete; “sometimes you catch and +sometimes you don't.” + +“That's it,” said Philip eagerly, “generally you don't--and then you +both haves to go home and come again,” he added nervously. + +But neither of the boys stirred. Outside the glow of the fire the +blackness looked terrible. Pete nuzzled up to Philip's side, and, being +untroubled by imaginative fears, soon began to feel drowsy. The sound of +his measured breathing startled Philip with the terror of loneliness. + +“Honour bright, Mr. Pete,” he faltered, nudging the head on his +shoulder, and trying to keep his voice from shaking; “_you_ call +yourself a second mate, and leaving all the work to me!” + +The second mate was penitent, but in less than half a minute more he was +committing the same offence again. “It isn't no use,” he said, “I'm that +sleepy you never seen.” + +“Then let's both take the watch below i'stead,” said Philip, and they +proceeded to stretch themselves out by the fire together. + +“Just lave it to me,” said Pete; “I'll hear them if they come in the +night. I'll always does. I'm sleeping that light it's shocking. Why, +sometimes I hear Black Tom when he comes home tipsy. I've done it +times.” + +“We'll have carpets to lie on to-morrow, not stones,” said Philip, +wriggling on a rough one; “rolls of carpets--kidaminstrel ones.” + +They settled themselves side by side as close to each other as they +could creep, and tried not to hear the surging and sighing of the sea. +Then came a tremulous whimper: + +“Pete!” + +“What's that?” + +“Don't you never say your prayers when you take the watch below?” + +“Sometimes we does, when mother isn't too tired, and the ould man's +middling drunk and quiet.” + +“Then don't you like to then?” + +“Aw, yes, though, I'm liking it scandalous.” + +The wreckers agreed to say their prayers, and got up again and said +them, knee to knee, with their two little faces to the fire, and then +stretched themselves out afresh. + +“Pete, where's your hand?” + +“Here you are, Phil.” + +In another minute, under the solemn darkness of the night, broken only +by the smouldering fire, amid the thunderous quake of the cavern after +every beat of the waves on the beach, the Carrasdhoo men were asleep. + +Sometime in the dark reaches before the dawn Pete leapt up with a start +“What's that?” he cried, in a voice of fear. + +But Philip was still in the mists of sleep, and, feeling the cold, he +only whimpered, “Cover me up, Pete.” + +“Phil!” cried Pete, in an affrighted whisper. + +“Cover me up,” drawled Philip. + +“I thought it was Black Tom,” said Pete. + +There was some confused bellowing outside the cave. + +“My goodness grayshers!” came in a terrible voice, “it's them, though, +the pair of them! Impozzible! who says it's impozzible? It's themselves +I'm telling you, ma'm. Guy heng! The woman's mad, putting a scream out +of herself like yonder. Safe? Coorse they're safe, bad luck to the young +wastrels! You're for putting up a prayer for your own one. Eh? Well, +I'm for hommering mine. The dirts? Weaned only yesterday, and fetching +a dacent man out of his bed to find them. A fire at them, too! Well, it +was the fire that found them. Pull the boat up, boys.” + +Philip was half awake by this time. “They've come,” he whispered. “The +ships is come, they're on the reef. Oh, dear me! Best go and meet them. +P'raps they won't kill us if--if we--Oh, dear me!” + +Then the wreckers, hand in hand, quaking and whimpering, stepped out to +the mouth of the cave. At the next moment Philip found himself snatched +up into the arms of Aunty Nan, who kissed him and cried over him, and +rammed a great chunk of sweet cake into his cheek. Pete was faring +differently. Under the leathern belt of Black Tom, who was thrashing him +for both of them, he was howling like the sea in a storm. + +Thus the Carrasdhoo men came home by the light of early morning--Pete +skipping before the belt and bellowing; and Philip holding a piece of +the cake at his teeth to comfort him. + + + + +IV. + +Philip left home for school at King William's by Castletown, and then +Pete had a hard upbringing. His mother was tender enough, and there were +good souls like Aunty Nan to show pity to both of them. But life went +like a springless bogey, nevertheless. Sin itself is often easier than +simpleness to pardon and condone. It takes a soft heart to feel tenderly +towards a soft head. + +Poor Pete's head seemed soft enough and to spare. No power and no +persuasion could teach him to read and write. He went to school at the +old schoolhouse by the church in Maughold village. The schoolmaster was +a little man called John Thomas Corlett, pert and proud, with the sharp +nose of a pike and the gait of a bantam. John Thomas was also a tailor. +On a cowhouse door laid across two school forms he sat cross-legged +among his cloth, his “maidens,” and his smoothing irons, with his boys +and girls, class by class, in a big half circle round about him. + +The great little man had one standing ground of daily assault on the +dusty jacket of poor Pete, and that was that the lad came late to +school. Every morning Pete's welcome from the tailor-schoolmaster was a +volley of expletives, and a swipe of the cane across his shoulders. “The +craythur! The dunce! The durt! I'm taiching him, and taiching him, and +he won't be taicht.” + +The soul of the schoolmaster had just two human weaknesses. One of these +was a weakness for drink, and as a little vessel he could not take much +without being full. Then he always taught the Church catechism and swore +at his boys in Manx. + +“Peter Quilliam,” he cried one day, “who brought you out of the land of +Egypt and the house of bondage?” + +“'Deed, master,” said Pete, “I never was in no such places, for I never +had the money nor the clothes for it, and that's how stories are getting +about.” + +The second of the schoolmaster's frailties was love of his daughter, a +child of four, a cripple, whom he had lamed in her infancy, by letting +her fall as he tossed her in his arms while in drink. The constant +terror of his mind was lest some further accident should befall her. +Between class and class he would go to a window, from which, when he had +thrown up its lower sash, dim with the scratches of names, he could see +one end of his own white cottage, and the little pathway, between lines +of gilvers, coming down from the porch. + +Pete had seen the little one hobbling along this path on her lame leg, +and giggling with a heart of glee when she had eluded the eyes of her +mother and escaped into the road. One day it chanced, after the heavy +spring rains had swollen every watercourse, that he came upon the little +curly poll, tumbling and tossing like a bell-buoy in a gale, down the +flood of the river that runs to the sea at Port Mooar. Pete rescued the +child and took her home, and then, as if he had done nothing unusual, he +went on to school, dripping water from his legs at every step. + +When John Thomas saw him coming, in bare feet, triddle-traddle, +triddle-traddle, up the school-house floor, his indignation at the boy +for being later than usual rose to fiery wrath for being drenched as +well. Waiting for no explanation, concluding that Pete had been fishing +for crabs among the stones of Port Lewaigue, he burst into a loud volley +of his accustomed expletives, and timed and punctuated them by a thwack +of the cane between every word. + +“The waistrel! (thwack). The dirt! (thwack). I'm taiching him (thwack), +and taiching him (thwack), and he won't be taicht!” (Thwack, thwack, +thwack.) + +Pete said never a word. Boiling his stinging shoulders under his jacket, +and ramming his smarting hands, like wet eels, into his breeches' +pockets, he took his place in silence at the bottom of the class. + +But a girl, a little dark thing in a red frock, stepped out from her +place beside the boy, shot up like a gleam to the schoolmaster as he +returned to his seat among the cloth and needles, dealt him a smart slap +across the face, and then burst into a lit of hysterical crying. Her +name was Katherine Cregeen. She was the daughter of Cæsar the Cornaa +miller, the founder of Ballajora Chapel, and a mighty man among the +Methodists. + +Katherine went unpunished, but that was the end of Pete's schooling. +His learning was not too heavy for a big lad's head to carry--a bit +of reading if it was all in print, and no writing at all except +half-a-dozen capital letters. It was not a formidable equipment for the +battle of life, but Bridget would not hear of more. + +She herself, meanwhile, had annexed that character which was always +the first and easiest to attach itself to a woman with a child but +no visible father for it--the character of a witch. That name for his +mother was Pete's earliest recollection of the high-road, and when the +consciousness of its meaning came to him, he did not rebel, but sullenly +acquiesced, for he had been born to it and knew nothing to the contrary. +If the boys quarrelled with him at play, the first word was “your +mother's a butch.” Then he cried at the reproach, or perhaps fought like +a vengeance at the insult, but he never dreamt of disbelieving the fact +or of loving his mother any the less. + +Bridget was accused of the evil eye. Cattle sickened in the fields, and +when there was no proof that she had looked over the gate, the idea was +suggested that she crossed them as a hare. One day a neighbour's dog +started a hare in a meadow where some cows were grazing. This was +observed by a gang of boys playing at hockey in the road. Instantly +there was a shout and a whoop, and the boys with their sticks were in +full chase after the yelping dog, crying, “The butch! The butch! It's +Bridget Tom! Corlett's dogs are hunting Bridget Black Tom! Kill her, +Laddie! Kill her, Sailor! Jump, dog, jump!” + +One of the boys playing at hockey was Pete. When his play-fellows ran +after the dogs in their fanatic thirst, he ran too, but with a storm of +other feelings. Outstripping all of them, very close at the heels of +the dogs, kicking some, striking others with the hockey-stick, while the +tears poured down his cheeks, he cried at the top of his voice to the +hare leaping in front, “Run, mammy, run! clink (dodge), mammy, clink! +Aw, mammy, mammy, run faster, run for your life, run!” + +The hare dodged aside, shot into a thicket, and escaped its pursuers +just as Corlett, the farmer, who had heard the outcry, came racing up +with a gun. Then Pete swept his coat-sleeve across his gleaming eyes and +leapt off home. When he got there, he found his mother sitting on the +bink by the door knitting quietly. He threw himself into her arms and +stroked her cheek with his hand. + +“Oh, mammy, bogh,” he cried, “how well you run! If you never run in your +life you run then.” + +“Is the boy mad?” said Bridget. + +But Pete went on stroking her cheek and crying between sobs of joy, “I +heard Corlett shouting to the house for a gun and a fourpenny bit, and +I thought I was never going to see mammy no more. But you did clink, +mammy! You did, though!” + +The next time Katherine Cregeen saw Peter Quilliam, he was sitting on +the ridge of rock at the mouth of Ballure Glen, playing doleful strains +on a home-made whistle, and looking the picture of desolation and +despair. His mother was lying near to death. He had left Mrs. Cregeen, +Kath-erine's mother, a good soul getting the name of Grannie, to watch +and tend her while he came out to comfort his simple heart in this lone +spot between the land and the sea. + +Katherine's eyes filled at sight of him, and when, without looking up or +speaking, he went on to play his crazy tunes, something took the girl by +the throat and she broke down utterly. + +“Never mind, Pete. No--I don't mean that--but don't cry, Pete.” + +Pete was not crying at all, but only playing away on his whistle and +gazing out to sea with a look of dumb vacancy. Katherine knelt beside +him, put her arms around his neck, and cried for both of them. + +Somebody hailed him from the hedge by the water-trough, and he rose, +took off his cap, smoothed his hair with his hand, and walked towards +the house without a word. + +Bridget was dying of pleurisy, brought on by a long day's work at hoeing +turnips in a soaking rain. Dr. Mylechreest had poulticed her lungs with +mustard and linseed, but all to no purpose. “It's feeling the same +as the sun on your back at harvest,” she murmured, yet the poultices +brought no heat to her frozen chest. + +Cæsar Cregeen was at her side; John the Clerk, too, called John the +Widow; Kelly, the rural postman, who went by the name of Kelly the +Thief; as well as Black Tom, her father. Cæsar was discoursing of +sinners and their latter end. John was remembering how at his election +to the clerkship he had rashly promised to bury the poor for nothing; +Kelly was thinking he would be the first to carry the news to Christian +Balla-whaine; and Black Tom was varying the exercise of pounding +rock-sugar for his bees with that of breaking his playful wit on the +dying woman. + +“No use; I'm laving you; I'm going on my long journey,” said Bridget, +while Granny used a shovel as a fan to relieve her gusty breathing. + +“Got anything in your pocket for the road, woman?” said the thatcher. + +“It's not houses of bricks and mortal I'm for calling at now,” she +answered. + +“Dear heart! Put up a bit of a prayer,” whispered Grannie to her +husband; and Cæsar took a pinch of snuff out of his waistcoat pocket, +and fell to “wrastling with the Lord.” + +Bridget seemed to be comforted. “I see the jasper gates,” she panted, +fixing her hazy eyes on the scraas under the thatch, from which broken +spiders' webs hung down like rats' tails. + +Then she called for Pete. She had something to give him. It was the +stocking foot with the eighty greasy Manx banknotes which his father, +Peter Christian, had paid her fifteen years before. Pete lit the candle +and steadied it while Grannie cut the stocking from the wall side of the +bed-ticking. + +Black Tom dropped the sugar-pounder and exposed his broken teeth in his +surprise at so much wealth; John the Widow blinked; and Kelly the Thief +poked his head forward until the peak of his postman's cap fell on to +the bridge of his nose. + +A sea-fog lay over the land that morning, and when it lifted Bridget's +soul went up as well. + +“Poor thing! Poor thing!” said Grannie. “The ways were cold for +her--cold, cold!” + +“A dacent lass,” said John the Clerk; “and oughtn't to be buried with +the common trash, seeing she's left money.” + +“A hard-working woman, too, and on her feet for ever; but 'lowanced in +her intellecks, for all,” said Kelly. + +And Cæsar cried, “A brand plucked from the burning! Lord, give me more +of the like at the judgment.” + +When all was over, and tears both hot and cold were wiped away--Pete +shed none of them--the neighbours who had stood with the lad in the +churchyard on Maughold Head returned to the cottage by the water-trough +to decide what was to be done with his eighty good bank-notes. “It's +a fortune,” said one. “Let him put it with Mr. Dumbell,” said another. +“Get the boy a trade first--he's a big lump now, sixteen for spring,” + said a third. “A draper, eh?” said a fourth. “May I presume? My nephew, +Bobbie Clucas, of Ramsey, now?” “A dacent man, very,” said John the +Widow; “but if I'm not ambitious, there's my son-in-law, John Cowley. +The lad's cut to a dot for a grocer, and what more nicer than having +your own shop and your own name over the door, if you plaze--' Peter +Quilliam, tay and sugar merchant!'--they're telling me John will be +riding in his carriage and pair soon.” + +“Chut! your grannie and your carriage and pairs,” shouted a rasping +voice at last. It was Black Tom. “Who says the fortune is belonging to +the lad at all? It's mine, and if there's law in the land I'll have it.” + +Meanwhile, Pete, with the dull thud in his ears of earth falling on a +coffin, had made his way down to Ballawhaine. He had never been there +before, and he felt confused, but he did not tremble. Half-way up the +carriage-drive he passed a sandy-haired youth of his own age, a slim +dandy who hummed a tune and looked at him carelessly over his shoulder. +Pete knew him--he was Boss, the boys called him Dross, son and heir of +Christian Ballawhaine. + +At the big house Pete asked for the master. The English footman, in +scarlet knee-breeches, left him to wait in the stone hall. The place was +very quiet and rather cold, but all as clean as a gull's wing. There was +a dark table in the middle and a high-backed chair against the wall. Two +oil pictures faced each other from opposite sides. One was of an old man +without a beard, but with a high forehead, framed around with short grey +hair. The other was of a woman with a tired look and a baby on her lap. +Under this there was a little black picture that seemed to Pete to be +the likeness of a fancy tombstone. And the print on it, so far as Pete +could spell it out, was that of a tombstone too, “In loving memory of +Verbena, beloved wife of Peter Chr--” + +The Ballawhaine came crunching the sand on the hall-floor. He looked +old, and had now a pent-house of bristly eyebrows of a different colour +from his hair. Pete had often seen him on the road riding by. + +“Well, my lad, what can I do for _you?_” he said. He spoke in a jerky +voice, as if he thought to overawe the boy. + +Pete fumbled his stocking cap. “Mothers dead,” he answered vacantly. + +The Ballawhaine knew that already. Kelly the Thief had run hot-foot to +inform him. He thought Pete had come to claim maintenance now that his +mother was gone. + +“So she's been telling you the same old story?” he said briskly. • + +At that Pete's face stiffened all at once. “She's been telling me that +you're my father, sir.” + +The Ballawhaine tried to laugh. “Indeed!” he replied; “it's a wise +child, now, that knows its own father.” + +“I'm not rightly knowing what you mane, sir,” said Pete. + +Then the Ballawhaine fell to slandering the poor woman in her grave, +declaring that she could not know who was the father of her child, and +protesting that no son of hers should ever see the colour of money of +his. Saying this with a snarl, he brought down his right hand with a +thump on to the table. There was a big hairy mole near the joint of the +first finger. + +“Aisy, sir, if you plaze,” said Pete; “she was telling me you gave her +this.” + +He turned up the corner of his jersey, tugged out of his pocket, from +behind his flaps, the eighty Manx bank-notes, and held them in his right +hand on the table. There was a mole at the joint of Pete's first finger +also. + +The Ballawhaine saw it. He drew back his hand and slid it behind him. +Then in another voice he said, “Well, my lad, isn't it enough? What are +you wanting with more?” + +“I'm not wanting more,” said Pete; “I'm not wanting this. Take it back,” + and he put down the roll of notes between them. + +The Ballawhaine sank into the chair, took a handkerchief out of his +tails with the hand that had been lurking there, and began to mop his +forehead. “Eh? How? What d'ye mean, boy?” he stammered. + +“I mane,” said Pete, “that if I kept that money there is people would +say my mother was a bad woman, and you bought her and paid her--I'm +hearing the like at some of them.” + +He took a step nearer. “And I mane, too, that you did wrong by my mother +long ago, and now that she's dead you're blackening her; and you're a +bad heart, and a low tongue, and if I was only a man, and didn't _know_ +you were my father, I'd break every bone in your skin.” + +Then Pete twisted about and shouted into the dark part of the hall, +“Come along, there, my ould cockatoo! It's time to be putting me to the +door.” + +The English footman in the scarlet breeches had been peeping from under +the stairs. + +That was Pete's first and last interview with his father. Peter +Christian Ballawhaine was a terror in the Keys by this time, but he had +trembled before his son like a whipped cur. + + + + +V. + +Katherine Cregeen, Pete's champion at school, had been his companion at +home as well. She was two years younger than Pete. Her hair was a black +as a gipsy's, and her face as brown as a berry. In summer she liked +best to wear a red frock without sleeves, no boots and no stockings, no +collar and no bonnet, not even a sun-bonnet. From constant exposure +to the sun and rain her arms and legs were as ruddy as her cheeks, and +covered with a soft silken down. So often did you see her teeth that you +would have said she was always laughing. Her laugh was a little saucy +trill given out with head aside and eyes aslant, like that of a squirrel +when he is at a safe height above your head, and has a nut in his open +jaws. + +Pete had seen her first at school, and there he had tried to draw the +eyes of the maiden upon himself by methods known only to heroes, to +savages, and to boys. He had prowled around her in the playground with +the wild vigour of a young colt, tossing his head, swinging his arms, +screwing his body, kicking up his legs, walking on his hands, lunging +out at every lad that was twice as big as himself, and then bringing +himself down at length with a whoop and a crash on his hindmost parts +just in front of where she stood. For these tremendous efforts to show +what a fellow he could be if he tried, he had won no applause from the +boys, and Katherine herself had given no sign, though Pete had watched +her out of the corners of his eyes. But in other scenes the children +came together. + +After Philip had gone to King William's, Pete and Katherine had become +bosom friends. Instead of going home after school to cool his heels in +the road until his mother came from the fields, he found it neighbourly +to go up to Ballajora and round by the network of paths to Cornaa. That +was a long detour, but Cæsar's mill stood there. It nestled down in the +low bed of the river that runs through the glen called Ballaglass. + +Song-birds built about it in the spring of the year, and Cæsar's little +human songster sang there always. + +When Pete went that way home, what times the girl had of it! Wading up +the river, clambering over the stones, playing female Blondin on the +fallen tree-trunks that spanned the chasm, slipping, falling, holding on +any way up (legs or arms) by the rotten branches below, then calling for +Pete's help in a voice between a laugh and a cry, flinging chips into +the foaming back-wash of the mill-wheel, and chasing them down stream, +racing among the gorse, and then lying full length like a lamb, without +a thought of shame, while Pete took the thorns out of her bleeding feet. +She was a wild duck in the glen where she lived, and Pete was a great +lumbering tame duck waddling behind her. + +But the glorious, happy, make-believe days too soon came to an end. The +swinging cane of the great John Thomas Corlett, and the rod of a yet +more relentless tyrant, darkened the sunshine of both the children. Pete +was banished from school, and Catherine's father removed from Cornaa. + +When Cæsar had taken a wife, he had married Betsy, the daughter of the +owner of the inn at Sulby. After that he had “got religion,” and he held +that persons in the household of faith were not to drink, or to buy or +to sell drink. But Grannie's father died and left his house, “The Manx +Fairy,” and his farm, Glenmooar, to her and her husband. About the same +time the miller at Sulby also died, and the best mill in the island +cried out for a tenant. Cæsar took the mill and the farm, and Grannie +took the inn, being brought up to such profanities and no way bound by +principle. From that time forward, Cæsar pinned all envious cavillers +with the text which says, “Not that which goeth into the mouth of a man +defileth him, but that which cometh out.” + +Nevertheless, Cæsar's principles grew more and more puritanical year by +year. There were no half measures with Cæsar. Either a man was a saved +soul, or he was in the very belly of hell, though the pit might not have +shut its mouth on him. If a man was saved he knew it, and if he felt +the manifestations of the Spirit he could live without sin. His cardinal +principles were three--instantaneous regeneration, assurance, +and sinless perfection. He always said--he had said it a thousand +times--that he was converted in Douglas marketplace, a piece off the +west door of ould St. Matthew's, at five-and-twenty minutes past six on +a Sabbath evening in July, when he was two-and-twenty for harvest. + +While at Cornaa, Cæsar had been a “local” on the preachers' plan, a +class leader, and a chapel steward; but at Sulby he outgrew the Union +and set up a “body” of his own. He called them “The Christians.” a title +that was at once a name, a challenge, and a protest. They worshipped +in the long barn over Cæsar's mill, and held strong views on conduct. A +saved soul must not wear gold or costly apparel, or give way to softness +or bodily indulgence, or go to fairs for sake of sport, or appear in +the show-tents of play-actors, or sing songs, or read books, or take +any diversion that did not tend to the knowledge of God. As for carnal +transgression, if any were guilty of it, they were to be cut off from +the body of believers, for the souls of the righteous must be delivered. + +“The religion that's going among the Primitives these days is just +Popery,” said Cæsar. “Let's go back to the warm ould Methodism and put +out the Romans.” + +When Pete turned his face from Ballawhaine, he thought first of Cæsar +and his mill. It would be more exact to say he thought of Katherine +and Grannie. He was homeless as well as penniless. The cottage by the +water-trough was no longer possible to him, now that the mother was gone +who had stood between his threatened shoulders and Black Tom. Philip +was at home for a few weeks only in the year, and Ballure had lost its +attraction. So Pete made his way to Sulby, offered himself to Cæsar for +service at the mill, and was taken on straightway at eighteenpence a +week and his board. + +It was a curious household he entered into. First there was Cæsar +himself, in a moleskin waistcoat with sleeves open three buttons up, +knee-breeches usually unlaced, stockings of undyed wool, and slippers +with the tongues hanging out--a grim soul, with whiskers like a hoop +about his face, and a shaven upper lip as heavy as a moustache, for, +when religion like Cæsar's lays hold of a man, it takes him first by +the mouth. Then Grannie, a comfortable body in a cap, with an outlook on +life that was all motherhood, a simple, tender, peaceable soul, agreeing +with everybody and everything, and seeming to say nothing but “Poor +thing! Poor thing!” and “Dear heart! Dear heart!” Then there was +Nancy Cain, getting the name of Nancy Joe, the servant in name but +the mistress in fact, a niece of Grannie's, a bit of a Pagan, an early +riser, a tireless worker, with a plain face, a rooted disbelief in all +men, a good heart, an ugly tongue, and a vixenish temper. Last of all, +there was Katherine, now grown to be a great girl, with her gipsy hair +done up in a red ribbon and wearing a black pinafore bordered with white +braid. + +Pete got on steadily at the mill. He began by lighting the kiln fire and +cleaning out the pit-wheel, and then on to the opening the flood-gates +in the morning and regulating the action of the water-wheel according to +the work of the day. In two years' time he was a sound miller, safe to +trust with rough stuff for cattle or fine flour for white loaf-bread. +Cæsar trusted him. He would take evangelising journeys to Peel or +Douglas and leave Pete in charge. + +That led to the end of the beginning. Pete could grind the farmers' +corn, but he could not make their reckonings. He kept his counts in +chalk on the back of the mill-house door, a down line for every stone +weight up to eight stones, and a line across for every hundredweight. +Then, once a day, while the father was abroad, Katherine came over from +the inn to the desk at the little window of the mill, and turned Pete's +lines into ledger accounts. These financial councils were full of +delicious discomfiture. Pete always enjoyed them--after they were over. + +“John Robert--Molleycarane--did you say Molleycarane, Pete? Oh, +Mylecharane--Myle-c-h-a-r-a-i-n-e, Molleycarane; ten stones--did you +say ten? Oh, eight--e-i-g-h-t--no, eight; oatmeal, Pete? Oh, +barley-male--meal, I mean--m-e-a-l.” + +In the middle of the night Pete remembered all these entries. They were +very precious to his memory after Katherine had spoken them. They sang +in his heart the same as song-birds then. They were like hymns and tunes +and pieces of poetry. + +Cæsar returned home from a preaching tour with a great and sudden +thought. He had been calling on strangers to flee from the wrath to +come, and yet there were those of his own house whose faces were not +turned Zionwards. That evening he held an all-night prayer-meeting for +the conversion of Katherine and Pete. Through six long hours he called +on God in lusty tones, until his throat cracked and his forehead +streamed. The young were thoughtless, they had the root of evil in them, +they flew into frivolity from contrariness. Draw the harrow over their +souls, plough the fallows of their hearts, grind the chaff out of their +household, let not the sweet apple and the crabs grow on the same bough +together, give them a Melliah, let not a sheaf be forgotten, grant them +the soul of this girl for a harvest-home, and of this boy for a last +stook. + +Cæsar was dissatisfied with the results. He was used to groaning and +trembling and fainting fits. + +“Don't you feel the love?” he cried. “I do--here, under the watch-pocket +of my waistcoat.” + +Towards midnight Katherine began to fail. “Chain the devil,”, cried +Cæsar. “Once I was down in the pit with the devil myself, but now I'm +up in the loft, seeing angels through the thatch. Can't you feel the +workings of the Spirit?” + +As the clock was warning to strike two Katherine thought she could, +and from that day forward she led the singing of the women in the choir +among “The Christians.” + +Pete remained among the unregenerate; but nevertheless “The Christians” + saw him constantly. He sat on the back form and kept his eyes fixed on +the “singing seat.” Observing his regularity, Cæsar laid a hand on his +head and told him the Spirit was working in his soul at last. Sometimes +Pete thought it was, and that was when he shut his eyes and listened to +Katherine's voice floating up, up, up, like an angel's, into the sky. +But sometimes he knew it was not; and that was when he caught himself +in the middle of Cæsar's mightiest prayers crooking his neck past the +pitching bald pate of Johnny Niplightly, the constable, that he might +get a glimpse of the top of Katherine's bonnet when her eyes were down. + +Pete fell into a melancholy, and once more took to music as a comforter. +It was not a home-made whistle now, but a fiddle bought out of his +wages. On this he played in the cowhouse on winter evenings, and from +the top of the midden outside in summer. When Cæsar heard of it his +wrath was fearful. What was a fiddler? He was a servant of corruption, +holding a candle to disorderly walkers and happy sinners on their way +into the devil's pinfold. And what for was fiddles? Fiddles was for +play-actors and theaytres. “And theaytres is _there_,” said Cæsar, +indicating with his foot one flag on the kitchen-floor, “and hell flames +is _there_,” he added, rolling his toe over to the joint of the next +one. + +Grannie began to plead. What was a fiddle if you played the right tunes +on it? Didn't they read in the ould Book of King David himself playing +on harps and timbrels and such things? And what was harps but fiddles in +a way of spak-ing? Then warn't they all looking to be playing harps in +heaven? 'Deed, yes, though the Lord would have to be teaching her how to +play hers! + +Cæsar was shaken. “Well, of course, certainly,” he said, “if there's a +power in fiddling to bring souls out of bondage, and if there's going to +be fiddling and the like in Abraham's bosom--why, then, of course--well, +why not?--let's have the lad's fiddle up at 'The Christians.'” + +Nothing could have suited Pete so well. From that time forward he went +out no more at nights to the cowhouse, but stayed indoors to practise +hymns with Katherine. Oh, the terrible rapture of those nightly +“practices!” They brought people to the inn to hear them, and so Cæsar +found them good for profit both ways. + +There was something in Cæsar's definition, nevertheless. It was found +that among the saints there were certain weaker brethren who did not +want a hymn to their ale. One of these was Johnny Niplightly, the rural +constable, who was the complement of Katherine in the choir, being +leader of the singing among the men. He was a tall man with a long nose, +which seemed to have a perpetual cold. Making his rounds one night, he +turned in at “The Manx Fairy,” when Cæsar and Grannie were both +from home, and Nancy Joe was in charge, and Pete and Katherine were +practising a revival chorus. + +“Where's Cæsar, dough?” he snuffled. + +“At Peel, buying the stock,” snapped Nancy. + +“Dank de Lord! I mean--where's Grannie?” + +“Nursing Mistress Quiggin.” + +Niplightly eased the strap of his beaver, liberated his lips, took a +deep draught of ale, and then turned to Pete, with apologetic smiles, +and suggested a change in the music. + +At that Katherine leapt up as light as laughter. “A dance,” she cried, +“a dance!” + +“Good sakes alive?” said Nancy Joe. “Listen to the girl? Is it the moon, +Kitty, or what is it that's doing on you?” + +“Shut your eyes, Nancy,” said Katherine, “just for once, now won't you?” + +“You can do what you like with me, with your coaxing and woaxing,” said +Nancy. “Enjoy yourself to the full, girl, but don't make a noise above +the singing of the kettle.” + +Pete tuned his strings, and Katherine pinned up the tail of her skirt, +and threw herself into position. + +At the sound of the livelier preludings there came thronging out of the +road into the parlour certain fellows of the baser sort, and behind them +came one who was not of that denomination--a fair young man with a fine +face under an Alpine hat. Heeding nothing of this audience, the girl +gave a little rakish toss of her head and called on Pete to strike up. + +Then Pete plunged into one of the profaner tunes which he had practised +in the days of the cowhouse, and off went Katherine with a whoop. The +boys stood back for her, bending down on their haunches as at a fight of +gamecocks, and encouraging her with shouts of applause. + +“Beautiful! Look at that now! Fine, though, fine! Clane done, aw, clane! +Done to a dot! There's leaping for you, boys! Guy heng, did you ever see +the like? Hommer the floor, girl--higher a piece! higher, then! Whoop, +did ye ever see such a nate pair of ankles?” + +“Hould your dirty tongue, you gobmouthed omathaun!” cried Nancy Joe. She +had tried to keep her eyes away, but could not. “My goodness grayshers!” + she cried. “Did you ever see the like, though? Screwing like the +windmill on the schoolhouse! Well, well, Kitty, woman! Aw, Kirry, Kirry! +Wherever did she get it, then? Goodsakes, the girl's twisting herself +into knots!” + +Pete was pulling away at the fiddle with both hands, like a bottom +sawyer, his eyes dancing, his lips quivering, the whole soul of the lad +lifted out of himself in an instant. + +“Hould on still, Kate, hould on, girl!” he shouted. “Ma-chree! Machree! +The darling's dancing like a drumstick!” + +“Faster!” cried Kate. “Faster!” + +The red ribbon had fallen from her head, and the wavy black hair was +tumbling about her face. She was holding up her skirt with one hand, +and the other arm was akimbo at her waist. Guggling, chuckling, crowing, +panting, boiling, and bubbling with the animal life which all her days +had been suppressed, and famished and starved into moans and groans, she +was carried away by her own fire, gave herself up to it, and danced +on the flags of the kitchen which had served Cæsar for his practical +typology, like a creature intoxicated with new breath. + +Meantime Cæsar himself, coming home in his chapel hat (his tall black +beaver) from Peel, where he had been buying the year's stock of herrings +at the boat's side, had overtaken, on the road, the venerable parson of +his parish, Parson Quiggin of Lezayre. Drawing up the gig with a “Woa!” + he had invited the old clergyman to a lift by his side on the gig's +seat, which was cushioned with a sack of hay. The parson had accepted +the invitation, and with a preliminary “Aisy! Your legs a taste higher, +sir, just to keep the pickle off your trousers,” a “Gee up!” and a touch +of the whip, they were away together, with the light of the gig-lamp on +the hind-quarters of the mare, as they bobbed and screwed like a +mill-race under the splash-hoard. + +It was Cæsar's chance, and he took it. Having pinned one of the heads +of the Church, he gave him his views on the Romans, and on the general +encroachment of Popery. The parson listened complacently. He was a +tolerant old soul, with a round face, expressive of perpetual happiness, +though he was always blinking his little eyes and declaring, with the +Preacher, that all earthly things were vain. Hence he was nicknamed Old +Vanity of Vanities. + +The gig had swept past Sulby Chapel when Cæsar began to ask for the +parson's opinion of certain texts. + +“And may I presume, Pazon Quiggin, what d'ye think of the text--'Praise +the Lord. O my soul, and all that is within me praise His Holy Name?'” + +“A very good text after meat, Mr. Cregeen,” said the parson, blinking +his little eyes in the dark. + +It was Cæsar's favourite text, and his fire was kindled at the parson's +praise. “Man alive,” he cried, his hot breath tickling the parson's +neck, “I've praiched on that text, pazon, till it's wet me through to +the waistcoat.” + +They were near to “The Manx Fairy” by this time. + +“And talking of praise,” said Cæsar, “I hear them there at their +practices. Asking pardon now--it's proud I'd be, sir--perhaps you'd not +be thinking mane to come in and hear the way we do 'Crown Him!'” + +“So the saints use the fiddle,” said the parson, as the gig drew up at +the porch of the inn. + +Half a minute afterwards the door of the parlour flew open with a bang, +and Cæsar stood and glared on the threshold with the parson's ruddy face +behind him. There was a moment's silence. The uplifted toe of Katherine +trailed back to the ground, the fiddle of Pete slithered to his farther +side, and the smacking lips of Niplightly transfixed themselves agape. +Then the voice of the parson was heard to say, “Vanity, vanity, all is +vanity!” and suddenly Cæsar, still on the threshold, went down on his +knees to pray. + +Cæsar's prayer was only a short one. His mortified pride called for +quicker solace. Rising to his feet with as much dignity as he could +command under the twinkling eyes of the parson, he stuttered, “The +capers! Making a dacent house into a theaytre! Respectable person, +too--one of the first that's going! So,” facing the spectators, “just +help yourselves home the pack of you! As for these ones,” turning on +Kate, Pete, and the constable, “there'll be no more of your practices. +I'll do without the music of three saints like you. In future I'll have +three sinners to raise my singing. These polices, too!” he said with +a withering smile. (Niplightly was worming his way out at the back of +Parson Quiggin.) + +“Who began it?” shouted Cæsar, looking at Katherine. + +From the moment that Cæsar dropped on his knees at the door, Pete had +been well-nigh choked by an impulse to laugh aloud. But now he bit his +lip and said, “I did!” + +“Behould ye now, as imperent as a goat!” said Cæsar, working his +eyebrows vigorously. “You've mistaken your profession, boy. It's a +play-actorer they ought to be making of you. You're wasting your time +with a plain, respectable man like me. You must lave me. Away to the +loft for your chiss, boy! And just give sheet, my lad, and don't lay to +till you've fetched up at another lodgings.” + +Pete, with his eye on the parson's face, could control himself no +longer, and he laughed so loud that the room rang. + +“Right's the word, ould Nebucannezzar,” he cried, and heaved up to his +feet. “So long, Kitty, woman! S'long! We'll finish it another night +though, and then the ould man himself will be houlding the candle.” + +Outside in the road somebody touched him on the shoulder. It was the +young man in the Alpine hat. + +“My gough! What? Phil!” cried Pete, and he laid hold of him with both +hands at once. + +“I've just finished at King William's and bought a boat,” said Philip, +“and I came up to ask you to join me--congers and cods, you know--good +fun anyway. Are you willing?” + +“Willing!” cried Pete. “Am I jumping for joy?” + +And away they went down the road, swinging their legs together with a +lively step. + +“That's a nice girl, though--Kitty, Kate, what do you call her?” said +Phil. + +“Were you in then? So you saw her dancing?” said Pete eagerly. “Aw, yes, +nice,” he said warmly, “nice uncommon,” he added absently, and then with +a touch of sadness, “shocking nice!” + +Presently they heard the pattering of light feet in the darkness behind +them, and a voice like a broken cry calling “Pete!” + +It was Kate. She came up panting and catching her breath in hiccoughs, +took Pete's face in both her hands, drew it down to her own face, kissed +it on the mouth, and was gone again without a word. + + + + +VI. + +Philip had not been a success at school; he had narrowly escaped being +a failure. During his earlier years he had shown industry without gifts; +during his later years he had shown gifts without industry. His childish +saying became his by-word, and half in sport, half in earnest, with a +smile on his lips, and a shuddering sense of fascination, he would say +when the wind freshened, “The sea's calling me, I must be off.” The +blood of the old sea-dog, his mother's father, was strong in him. +Idleness led to disaster, and disaster to some disgrace. He was +indifferent to both while at school, but shame found him out at home. + +“You'll be sixteen for spring,” said Auntie Nan, “and what would your +poor father say if he were alive? He thought worlds of his boy, and +always said what a man he would be some day.” + +That was the shaft that found Philip. The one passion that burned in his +heart like a fire was reverence for the name and the will of his dead +father. The big hopes of the broken man had sometimes come as a torture +to the boy when the blood of the old salt was rioting within him. But +now they came as a spur. + +Philip went back to school and worked like a slave. There were only +three terms left, and it was too late for high honours, but the boy did +wonders. He came out well, and the masters were astonished. “After all,” + they said, “there's no denying it, the boy Christian must have the gift +of genius. There's nothing he might not do.” + +If Phil had much of the blood of Captain Billy, Pete had much of the +blood of Black Tom. After leaving the mill at Sulby, Pete made his home +in the cabin of the smack. What he was to eat, and how he was to be +clothed, and where he was to be lodged when the cold nights came, never +troubled his mind for an instant. He had fine times with his partner. +The terms of their partnership were simple. Phil took the fun and made +Pete take the fish. They were a pair of happy-go-lucky lads, and they +looked to the future with cheerful faces. + +There was one shadow over their content, and that was the ghost of a +gleam of sunshine. It made daylight between them, though, day by day +as they ran together like two that run a race. The prize was Katherine +Cregeen. Pete talked of her till Phil's heart awoke and trembled; but +Phil hardly knew it was so, and Pete never once suspected it. Neither +confessed to the other, and the shifts of both to hide the secret of +each were boyish and beautiful. + +There is a river famous for trout that rises in Sulby glen and flows +into Ramsey harbour. One of the little attempts of the two lads to +deceive each other was to make believe that it was their duty to fish +this river with the rod, and so wander away singly up the banks of the +stream until they came to “The Manx Fairy,” and then drop in casually +to quench the thirst of so much angling. Towards the dusk of evening +Philip, in a tall silk hat over a jacket and knickerbockers, would come +upon Pete by the Sulby bridge, washed, combed, and in a collar. Then +there would be looks of great surprise on both sides. “What, Phil! Is +it yourself, though? Just thought I'd see if the trouts were biting +to-night. Dear me, this is Sulby too! And bless my soul, 'The Fairy' +again I Well, a drop of drink will do no harm. Shall we put a sight +on them inside, eh?” After that prelude they would go into the house +together. + +This little comedy was acted every night for weeks. It was acted on +Hollantide Eve six months after Pete had been turned out by Cæsar. +Grannie was sitting by the glass partition, knitting at intervals, +serving at the counter occasionally and scoring up on a black board that +was a mass of chalk hieroglyphics. Cæsar himself in ponderous spectacles +and with a big book in his hands was sitting in the kitchen behind with +his back to the glass, so as to make the lamp of the business serve also +for his studies. On a bench in the bar sat Black Tom, smoking, spitting, +scraping his feet on the sanded floor, and looking like a gigantic +spider with enormous bald head. At his side was a thin man with a face +pitted by smallpox, and a forehead covered with strange protuberances. +This was Jonaique Jelly, barber, clock-mender, and Manx patriot. The +postman was there, too, Kelly the Thief, a tiny creature with twinkling +ferret eyes, and a face that had a settled look of age, as of one born +old, being wrinkled in squares like the pointing of a cobble wall. + +At sight of Pete, Grannie made way, and he pushed through to the +kitchen, where he seated himself in a seat in the fireplace just in +front of the peat closet, and under the fish hanging to smoke. At sight +of Phil she dropped her needles, smoothed her front hair, rose in spite +of protest, and wiped down a chair by the ingle. Cæsar eyed Pete in +silence from between the top rim of his spectacles and the bottom edge +of the big book; but as Philip entered he lowered the book and welcomed +him. Nancy Joe was coming and going in her clogs like a rip-rap let +loose between the dairy and a pot of potatoes in their jackets which +swung from the slowrie, the hook over the fire. A moment later Kate came +flitting through the half-lit kitchen, her black eyes dancing and her +mouth rippling in smiles. She courtesied to Philip, grimaced at Pete, +and disappeared. + +Then from the other side of the glass partition came the husky voice +of the postman, saying, “Well, I must be taking the road, gentlemen. +There's Manx ones starting for Kim-berley by the early sailing to-morrow +morning.” + +And then came the voice of the barber in a hoarse falsetto: “Kimberley! +That's the place for good men I'm always saying. There's Billy the Red +back home with a fortune. And ould Corlett--look at ould Corlett, the +Ballabeg! Five years away at the diggings, and left a house worth twenty +pounds per year per annum, not to spake of other hereditaments.” + +After that the rasping voice of Black Tom, in a tone of irony and +contempt: “Of coorse, aw, yes, of coorse, there's goold on the cushags +there, they're telling me. But I thought you were a man that's all for +the island, Mr. Jelly.” + +“Lave me alone for that,” said the voice of the barber. “Manx-land for +the Manx-man--that's the text I'm houlding to. But what's it saying, +'Custom must be indulged with custom, or custom will die?' And with +these English scouring over it like puffins on the Calf, it isn't much +that's left of the ould island but the name. The best of the Manx boys +are going away foreign, same as these ones.” + +“Well, I've letters for them to the packet-office anyway,” said the +postman. + +“Who are they, Mr. Kelly?” called Philip, through the doorway. + +“Some of the Quarks ones from Glen Rushen, sir, and the Gills boys from +Castletown over. Good-night all, goodnight!” + +The door closed behind the postman, and Black Tom growled, “Slips of +lads--I know them.” + +“Smart though, smart uncommon,” said the barber; “that's the only sort +they're wanting out yonder.” + +There was a contemptuous snort. “So? You'd better go to Kimberley +yourself, then.” + +“Turn the clock back a piece and I'll start before you've time to curl +your hair,” said the barber. + +Black Tom was lifting his pot. “That's the one thing,” said he, “the +Almighty Himself” (gulp, gulp) “can't do.” + +“Which?” tittered the barber. + +“Both,” said Black Tom, scratching his big head, as bald as a bladder. + +Cæsar flashed about with his face to the glass partition. “You're like +the rest of the infidels, sir,” said he, “only spaking to contradick +yourself--calling God the Almighty, and telling in the same breath of +something He can't do.” + +Meanwhile an encounter of another sort was going on at the ingle. Kate +had re-appeared with a table fork which she used at intervals to test +the boiling of the potatoes. At each approach to the fire she passed +close to where Pete sat, never looking at Phil above the level of his +boots. And as often as she bent over the pot, Pete put his arm round her +waist, being so near and so tempting. For thus pestering her she beat +her foot like a goat, and screwed on a look of anger which broke down in +a stifled laugh; but she always took care to come again to Pete's side +rather than to Phil's, until at last the nudging and shoving ended in a +pinch and a little squeal, and a quick cry of “What's that?” from Cæsar. + +Kate vanished like a flash, the dim room began to frown again, and Phil +to draw his breath heavily, when the girl came back as suddenly bringing +an apple and a length of string. Mounting a chair, she fixed one end of +the string to the lath of the ceiling by the peck, the parchment oatcake +pan, and the other end she tied to the stalk of the apple. + +“What's the jeel now?” said Pete. + +“Fancy! Don't you know? Not heard f'Hop-tu-naa'? It's Hollantide Eve, +man,” said Kate. + +Then setting the string going like a pendulum, she stood back a pace +with hands clasped behind her, and snapped at the apple as it swung, +sometimes catching it, sometimes missing it, sometimes marking it, +sometimes biting it, her body bending and rising with its waggle, and +nod, and bob, her mouth opening and closing, her white teeth gleaming, +and her whole face bubbling over with delight. At every touch the +speed increased, and the laughter grew louder as the apple went faster. +Everybody, except the miller, joined in the fun. Phil cried out on the +girl to look to her teeth, but Pete egged her on to test the strength of +them. + +“Snap at it, Kitty!” cried Pete. “Aw, lost! Lost again! Ow! One in the +cheek! No matter! Done!” + +And Black Tom and Mr. Jelly stood up to watch through the doorway. +“My goodness grayshers!” cried one. “What a mouthful!” said the other. +“Share it, Kitty, woman; aw, share and share alike, you know.” + +But then came the thunderous tones of Cæsar. “Drop it, drop it! Such +practices is nothing but Popery.” + +“Popery!” cried Black Tom from over the counter. “Chut! nonsense, man! +The like of it was going before St. Patrick was born.” + +Kate was puffing and panting and taking down the pendulum. + +“What does it mean then, Tom?” she said; “it's you for knowing things.” + +“Mane? It manes fairies!” + +“Fairies!” + +Black Tom sat down with a complacent air, and his rasping voice came +from the other side of the glass. “In the ould times gone by, girl, +before Manxmen got too big for their breeches, they'd be off to bed by +ten o'clock on Hollantide Eve to lave room for the little people that's +outside to come in. And the big woman of the house would be filling the +crocks for the fairies to drink, and the big man himself would be raking +the ashes so they might bake their cakes, and a girl, same as you, would +be going to bed backwards----” + +“I know! I know!” cried Kate, near to the ceiling, and clapping her +hands. “She eats a roasted apple, and goes to bed thirsty, and then +dreams that somebody brings her a drink of water, and that's the one +that's to be her husband, eh?” + +“You've got it, girl.” + +Cæsar had been listening with his eyes turned sideways off his book, +and now he cried, “Then drop it, I'm telling you. It's nothing but +instruments of Satan, and the ones that's telling it are just flying in +the face of faith from superstition and contrariety. It isn't dacent in +a Christian public-house, and I'm for having no more of it.” + +Grannie paused in her knitting, fixed her cap with one of her needles +and said, “Dear heart, father! Tom meant no harm.” Then, glancing at +the clock and rising, “But it's time to shut up the house, anyway. Good +night, Tom! Good night all! Good night!” + +Phil and Pete rose also. Pete went to the door and pretended to look +out, then came back to Kate's side and whispered, “Come, give them the +slip--there's somebody outside that's waiting for you.” + +“Let them wait,” said the girl, but she laughed, and Pete knew she would +come. Then he turned to Philip, “A word in your ear, Phil,” he said, and +took him by the arm and drew him out of the house and round to the yard +of the stable. + +“Well, good night, Grannie,” said Mr. Jelly, going out behind them. +“But if I were as young as your grandson there, Mr. Quilliam, I would be +making a start for somewhere.” + +“Grandson!” grunted Tom, heaving up, “I've got no grandson, or he +wouldn't be laving me to smoke a dry pipe. But he's making an Almighty +of this Phil Christian--that's it.” + +After they were gone, Grannie began counting the till and saying, “As +for fairies--one, two, three--it may be, as Cæsar says--four--five--the +like isn't in, but it's safer to be civil to them anyway.” + +“Aw, yes,” said Nancy Joe, “a crock of fresh water and a few good words +going to bed on Hollantide Eve does no harm at all, at all.” + +Outside in the stable-yard the feet of Black Tom and Jonaique Jelly +were heard going off on the road. The late moon was hanging low, red as +an evening sun, over the hill to the south-east. Pete was puffing and +blowing as if he had been running a race. “Quick, boy, quick!” he was +whispering, “Kate's coming. A word in your ear first. Will you do me a +turn, Phil?” + +“What is it?” said Philip. + +“Spake to the ould man for me while I spake to the girl!” + +“What about?” said Philip. + +But Pete could hear, nothing except his own voice. “The ould angel +herself, she's all right, but the ould man's hard. Spake for me, Phil; +you've got the fine English tongue at you.” + +“But what about?” Philip said again. + +“Say I may be a bit of a rip, but I'm not such a bad sort anyway. Make +me out a taste, Phil, and praise me up. Say I'll be as good as goold; +yes, will I though. Tell him he has only to say yes, and I'll be that +studdy and willing and hardworking and persevering you never seen.” + +“But, Pete, Pete, Pete, whatever am I to say all this about?” + +Pete's puffing and panting ceased. “What about? Why, about the girl for +sure.” + +“The girl!” said Philip. + +“What else?” said Pete. + +“Kate? Am I to speak for you to the father for Kate?” + +Philip's voice seemed to come up from the bottom depths of his throat. + +“Are you thinking hard of the job, Phil?” + +There was a moment's silence. The blood had rushed to Philip's face, +which was full of strange matter, but the darkness concealed it. + +“I didn't say that,” he faltered. + +Pete mistook Philip's hesitation for a silent commentary on his own +unworthiness. “I know I'm only a sort of a waistrel,” he said, “but, +Phil, the way I'm loving that girl it's shocking. I can never take rest +for thinking of her. No, I'm not sleeping at night nor working reg'lar +in the day neither. Everything is telling of her, and everything is +shouting her name. It's 'Kate' in the sea, and 'Kate' in the river, and +the trees and the gorse. 'Kate,' 'Kate,' 'Kate,' it's Kate constant, and +I can't stand much more of it. I'm loving the girl scandalous, that's +the truth, Phil.” + +Pete paused, but Philip gave no sign. + +“It's hard to praise me, that's sarten sure,” said Pete, “but I've known +her since she was a little small thing in pinafores, and I was a slip +of a big boy, and went into trousers, and we played Blondin in the glen +together.” + +Still Philip did not speak. He was gripping the stable-wall with his +trembling fingers, and struggling for composure. Pete scraped the +paving-stones at his feet, and mumbled again in a voice that was near +to breaking. “Spake for me, Phil. It's you to do it. You've the way of +saying things, and making them out to look something. It would be clane +ruined in a jiffy if I did it for myself. Spake for me, boy, now won't +you, now?” + +Still Philip was silent. He was doing his best to swallow a lump in +his throat. His heart had begun to know itself. In the light of Pete's +confession he had read his own secret. To give the girl up was one +thing; it was another to plead for her for Pete. But Pete's trouble +touched him. The lump at his throat went down, and the fingers on the +wall slacked away. “I'll do it,” he said, only his voice was like a sob. + +Then he tried to go off hastily that he might hide the emotion that came +over him like a flood that had broken its dam. But Pete gripped him by +the shoulder, and peered into his face in the dark. “You will, though,” + said Pete, with a little shout of joy; “then it's as good as done; God +bless you, old fellow.” + +Philip began to roll about. “Tut, it's nothing,” he said, with a stout +heart, and then he laughed a laugh with a cry in it. He could have said +no more without breaking down; but just then a flash of light fell on +them from the house, and a hushed voice cried, “Pete!” + +“It's herself,” whispered Pete. “She's coming! She's here!” + +Philip turned, and saw Kate in the doorway of the dairy, the sweet young +figure framed like a silhouette by the light behind. + +“I'm going!” said Philip, and he edged up to the house as the girl +stepped out. + +Pete followed him a step or two in approaching Kate. “Whist, man!” he +whispered. “Tell the old geezer I'll be going to chapel reglar early +tides and late shifts, and Sunday-school constant. And, whist! tell him +I'm larning myself to play on the harmonia.” + +Then Philip slithered softly through the dairy door, and shut it after +him, leaving Kate and Pete together. + + + + +VII. + +The kitchen of “The Manx Fairy” was now savoury with the odour of +herrings roasting in their own brine, and musical with the crackling and +frizzling of the oil as it dropped into the fire. + +“It's a long way back to Ballure, Mrs. Cregeen,” said Philip, popping +his head in at the door jamb. “May I stay to a bite of supper?” + +“Aw, stay and welcome,” said Cæsar, putting down the big book, and Nancy +Joe said the same, dropping her high-pitched voice perceptibly, and +Grannie said, also, “Right welcome, sir, if you'll not be thinking mane +to take pot luck with us. Potatoes and herrings, Mr. Christian; just a +Manxman's supper. Lift the pot off the slowrie, Nancy.” + +“Well, and isn't he a Manxman himself, mother?” said Cæsar. + +“Of course I am, Mr. Cregeen,” said Philip, laughing noisily. “If I'm +not, who should be, eh?'” + +“And Manxman or no Manxman, what for should he turn up his nose at +herrings same as these?” said Nancy Joe. She was dishing up a bowlful. +“Where'll he get the like of them? Not in England over, I'll go bail.” + +“Indeed, no, Nancy,” said Philip, still laughing needlessly. + +“And if they had them there, the poor, useless creatures would be lost +to cook them.” + +“'Deed, would they, Nancy,” said Grannie. She was rolling the potatoes +into a heap on to the bare table. “And we've much to be thankful for, +with potatoes and herrings three times a day; but we shouldn't be +thinking proud of our-selves for that.” + +“Ask the gentleman to draw up, mother,” said Cæsar. + +“Draw up, sir, draw up. Here's your bowl of butter-milk. A knife and +fork, Nancy. We're no people for knife and fork to a herring, sir. And +a plate for Mr. Christian, woman; a gentleman usually likes a plate. Now +ate, sir, ate and welcome--but where's your friend, though?” + +“Pete! oh! he's not far off.” Saying this, Philip interrupted his +laughter to distribute sage winks between Nancy Joe and Grannie. + +Cæsar looked around with a potato half peeled in his fingers. “And the +girl--where's Kate?” he asked. + +“She's not far off neither,” said Philip, still winking vigorously. “But +don't trouble about them, Mr. Cregeen. They'll want no supper. They're +feeding on sweeter things than herrings even.” Saying this he swallowed +a gulp with another laugh. + +Cæsar lifted his head with a pinch of his herring between finger and +thumb half way to his open mouth. “Were you spaking, sir?” he said. + +At that Philip laughed immoderately. It was a relief to drown with +laughter the riot going on within. + +“Aw, dear, what's agate of the boy?” thought Grannie. + +“Is it a dog bite that's working on him?” thought Nancy. + +“Speaking!” cried Philip, “of course I'm speaking. I've come in to +do it, Mr. Cregeen--I've come in to speak for Pete. He's fond of your +daughter, Cæsar, and wants your good-will to marry her.” + +“Lord-a-massy!” cried Nancy Joe. + +“Dear heart alive!” muttered Grannie. + +“Peter Quilliam!” said Cæsar, “did you say Peter?” + +“I did, Mr. Cregeen, Peter Quilliam,” said Philip stoutly, “my friend +Pete, a rough fellow, perhaps, and without much education, but the +best-hearted lad in the island. Come now, Cæsar, say the word, sir, and +make the young people happy.” + +He almost foundered over that last word, but Cæsar kept him up with a +searching look. + +“Why, I picked him out of the streets, as you might say,” said Cæsar. + +“So you did, Mr. Cregeen, so you did. I always thought you were a +discerning man, Cæsar. What do you say, Grannie? It's Cæsar for knowing +a deserving lad when he sees one, eh?” + +He gave another round of his cunning winks, and Grannie replied, “Aw, +well, it's nothing against either of them anyway.” + +Cæsar was gitting as straight as a crowbar and as grim as a gannet. “And +when he left me, he gave me imperence and disrespeck.” + +“But the lad meant no harm, father,” said Grannie; “and hadn't you told +him to take to the road?” + +“Let every bird hatch its own eggs, mother; it'll become you better,” + said Cæsar. “Yes, sir, the lip of Satan and the imperence of sin.” + +“Pete!” cried Philip, in a tone of incredulity; “why, he hasn't a +thought about you that isn't out of the Prayer-book.” + +Cæsar snorted. “No? Then maybe that's where he's going for his curses.” + +“No curses at all,” said Nancy Joe, from the side of the table, “but a +right good lad though, and you've never had another that's been a patch +on him.” + +Cæsar screwed round to her and said severely, “Where there's geese +there's dirt, and where there's women there's talking.” Then turning +back to Philip, he said in a tone of mock deference, “And may I +presume, sir--a little question--being a thing like that's general +understood--what's his fortune?” + +Philip fell back in his chair. “Fortune? Well, I didn't think that you +now----” + +“No?” said Cæsar. “We're not children of Israel in the wilderness +getting manna dropped from heaven twice a day. If it's only potatoes and +herrings itself, we're wanting it three times, you see.” + +Do what he would to crush it, Philip could not help feeling a sense of +relief. Fate was interfering; the girl was not for Pete. For the first +moment since he returned to the kitchen he breathed freely and fully. +But then came the prick of conscience: he had come to plead for Pete, +and he must be loyal; he must not yield; he must exhaust all his +resources of argument and persuasion. The wild idea occurred to him to +take Cæsar by force of the Bible. + +“But think what the old book says, Mr. Cregeen, 'take no thought for the +morrow'----” + +“That's what Johnny Niplightly said, Mr. Christian, when he lit my kiln +overnight and burnt my oats before morning.”. + +“'But consider the lilies'----” + +“I have considered them, sir; but I'm foiling still and mother has to +spin.” + +“And isn't Pete able to toil, too,” said Philip boldly. “Nobody better +in the island; there's not a lazy bone in his body, and he'll earn his +living anywhere.” + +“What _is_ his living, sir?” said Cæsar. + +Philip halted for an answer, and then said, “Well, he's only with me in +the boat at present, Mr. Cregeen.” + +“And what's he getting? His meat and drink and a bit of pence, eh? And +you'll be selling up some day, it's like, and going away to England +over, and then where is he? Let the girl marry a mother-naked man at +once.” + +“But you're wanting help yourself, father,” said Grannie. “Yes, you are +though, and time for chapel too and aisément in your old days----” + +“Give the lad my mill as well as my daughter, is that it, eh?” said +Cæsar. “No, I'm not such a goose as yonder, either. I could get heirs, +sir, heirs, bless ye--fifty acres and better, not to spake of the +bas'es. But I can do without them. The Lord's blest me with enough. I'm +not for daubing grease on the tail of the fat pig.” + +“Just so, Cæsar,” said Philip, “just so; you can afford to take a poor +man for your son-in-law, and there's Pete----” + +“I'd be badly in want of a bird, though, to give a groat for an owl,” + said Cæsar. + +“The lad means well, anyway,” said Grannie; “and he was that good to his +mother, poor thing--it was wonderful.” + +“I knew the woman,” said Cæsar; “I broke a sod of her grave myself. A +brand plucked from the burning, but not a straight walker in this +life. And what is the lad himself? A monument of sin without a name. A +bastard, what else? And that's not the port I'm sailing for.” + +Down to this point Philip had been torn by conflicting feelings. He +was no match for Cæsar in worldly logic, or at fencing with texts of +Scripture. The devil had been whispering at his ear, “Let it alone, +you'd better.” But his time had come at length to conquer both himself +and Cæsar. Rising to his feet at Cæsar's last word, he cried in a voice +of wrath, “What? You call yourself a Christian man, and punish the child +for the sin of the parent! No name, indeed! Let me tell you, Mr. Cæsar +Cregeen, it's possible to have one name in heaven that's worse than none +at all on earth, and that's the name of a hypocrite.” + +So saying he threw back his chair, and was making for the door, when +Cæsar rose and said softly, “Come into the bar and have something.” + Then, looking back at Philip's plate, he forced a laugh, and said, “But +you've turned over your herring, sir--that's bad luck.” And, putting a +hand on Philip's shoulder, he added, in a lower tone, “No disrespeck +to you, sir; and no harm to the lad, but take my word for it, Mr. +Christian, if there's an amble in the mare it'll be in the colt.” + +Philip went off without another word. The moon was rising and whitening +as he stepped from the door. Outside the porch a figure flitted past him +in the uncertain shadows with a merry trill of mischievous laughter. +He found Pete in the road, puffing and blowing as before, but from a +different cause. + +“The living devil's in the girl for sartin,” said Pete; “I can't get my +answer out of her either way.” He had been chasing her for his answer, +and she had escaped him through a gate. “But what luck with the ould +man, Phil?” + +Then Phil told him of the failure of his mission--told him plainly and +fully but tenderly, softening the hard sayings but revealing the whole +truth. As he did so he was conscious that he was not feeling like one +who brings bad news. He knew that his mouth in the darkness was screwed +up into an ugly smile, and, do what he would; he could not make it +straight and sorrowful. + +The happy laughter died off Pete's, lips, and he listened at first in +silence, and afterwards with low growls. When Phil showed him how his +poverty was his calamity he said, “Ay, ay, I'm only a wooden-spoon man.” + When Phil told him how Cæsar had ripped up their old dead quarrel he +muttered, “I'm on the ebby tide, Phil, that's it.” And when Phil hinted +at what Cæsar had said of his mother and of the impediment of his own +birth, a growl came up from the very depths of him, and he scraped the +stones under his feet and said, “He shall repent it yet; yes, shall he.” + +“Come, don't take it so much to heart--it's miserable to bring you +such bad news,” said Phil; but he knew the sickly smile was on his lips +still, and he hated himself for the sound of his own voice. + +Pete found no hollow ring in it. “God bless you, Phil,” he said; “you've +done the best for me, I know that. My pocket's as low as my heart, and +it isn't fair to the girl, or I shouldn't be asking the ould man's lave +anyway.” + +He stood a moment in silence, crunching the wooden laths of the +garden fence like matchwood in his fingers, and then said, with sudden +resolution, “I know what I'll do.” + +“What's that?” said Philip.. “I'll go abroad; I'll go to Kimberley.” + +“Never!” + +“Yes, will I though, and quick too. You heard what the men were saying +in the evening--there's Manx ones going by the boat in the morning? +Well, I'll go with them.” + +“And you talk of being low in your pocket,” said Phil. “Why, it will +take all you've got, man.” + +“And more, too,” said Pete, “but you'll lend me the lave of the +passage-money. That's getting into debt, but no matter. When a man +falls into the water he needn't mind the rain. I'll make good money out +yonder.” + +A light had appeared at the window of an upper room, and Pete shook +his clenched fist at it and cried, “Good-bye, Master Cregeen. I'll +put worlds between us. You were my master once, but nobody made you my +master for ever--neither you nor no man.” + +All this time Philip knew that hell was in his heart. The hand that +had let him loose when his anger got the better of him with Cæsar was +clutching at him again. Some evil voice at his ear was whispering, “Let +him go; lend him the money.” + +“Come on, Pete,” he faltered, “and don't talk nonsense!” + +But Pete heard nothing. He had taken a few steps forward, as far as to +the stable-yard, and was watching the light in the house. It was moving +from window to window of the dark wall. “She's taking the father's +candle,” he muttered. “She's there,” he said softly. “No, she has gone. +She's coming back though.” He lifted the stocking cap from his head and +fumbled it in his hands. “God bless her,” he murmured. He sank to his +knees on the ground. “And take care of her while I'm away.” + +The moon had come up in her whiteness behind, and all was quiet and +solemn around. Philip fell back and turned away his face. + + + + +VIII. + +When Cæsar came in after seeing Philip to the door, he said, “Not a word +of this to the girl. You that are women are like pigs--we've got to pull +the way we don't want you.” + +On that Kate herself came in, blushing a good deal, and fussing about +with great vigour. “Are you talking of the piggies, father?” she said +artfully. “How tiresome they are, to be sure! They came out into the +yard when the moon rose and I had such work to get them back.” + +Cæsar snorted a little, and gave the signal for bed. “Fairies indeed!” + he said, in a tone of vast contempt, going to the corner to wind the +clock. “Just wakeness of faith,” he said over the clank of the chain as +the weights rose; “and no trust in God neither,” he added, and then the +clock struck ten. + +Grannie had lit two candles--one for herself and her husband, the other +for Nancy Joe. Nancy had slyly filled three earthenware crocks with +water from the well, and had set them on the table, mumbling something +about the kettle and the morning. And Cæsar himself, pretending not to +see anything, and muttering dark words about waste, went from the clock +to the hearth, and raked out the hot ashes to a flat surface, on which +you might have laid a girdle for baking cakes. + +“Good-night, Nancy,” called Grannie, from half-way up the stairs, and +Cæsar, with his head down, followed grumbling. Nancy went off next, and +then Kate was left alone. She had to put out the lamp and wait for her +father's candle. + +When the lamp was gone the girl was in the dark, save for the dim light +of the smouldering fire. She began to tremble and to laugh in a whisper. +Her eyes danced in the red glow of the dying turf. She slipped off her +shoes and went to a closet in the wall. There she picked an apple out of +a barrel, and brought it to the fire and roasted it. Then, down on her +knees before the hearth, she took took two pinches of the apple and +swallowed them. After that and a little shudder she rose again, and +turned about to go to bed, backwards, slowly, tremblingly, with measured +steps, feeling her way past the furniture, having a shock when +she touched anything, and laughing to herself, nervously, when she +remembered what it was. + +At the door of her father's room and Grannie's she called, with a quaver +in her voice, and a sleepy grunt came out to her. She reached one hand +through the door, which was ajar, and took the burning candle. Then she +blew out the light with a trembling puff, that had to be twice repeated, +and made for her own bedroom, still going backwards. + +It was a sweet little chamber over the dairy, smelling of new milk and +ripe apples, and very dainty in dimity and muslin. Two tiny windows +looked out from it, one on to the stable-yard and the other on to the +orchard. The late moon came through the orchard window, over the heads +of the dwarf trees, and the little white place was lit up from the floor +to the sloping thatch. + +Kate went backwards as far as to the bed, and sat down on it She fancied +she heard a step in the yard, but the yard window was at her back, and +she would not look behind. She listened, but heard nothing more except a +see-sawing noise from the stable, where the mare was running her rope +in the manger ring. Nothing but this and the cheep-cheep of a mouse that +was gnawing the wood somewhere in the floor. + +“Will he come?” she asked herself. + +She rose and loosened her gown, and as it fell to her feet she laughed. + +“Which will it be, I wonder--which?” she whispered. + +The moonlight had crept up to the foot of the bed, and now lay on +it like a broad blue sword speckled as with rust by the patchwork +counterpane. + +She freed her hair from its red ribbon, and it fell in a shower about +her face. All around her seemed hushed and awful. She shuddered again, +and with a back ward hand drew down the sheets. Then she took a long, +deep breath, like a sigh that is half a smile, and lay down to sleep. + + + + +IX. + +Somewhere towards the dawn, in the vague shadow-land between a dream and +the awakening, Kate thought she was startled by a handful of rice thrown +at her carriage on her marriage morning. The rattle came again, and +then she knew it was from gravel dashed at her bedroom window. As she +recognised the sound, a voice came as through a cavern, crying, “Kate!” + She was fully awake by this time. “Then it's to be Pete,” she thought. +“It's bound to be Pete, it's like,” she told herself. “It's himself +outside, anyway.” + +It was Pete indeed. He was standing in the thin darkness under the +window, calling the girl's name out of the back of his throat, and +whistling to her in a sort of whisper. Presently he heard a movement +inside the room, and he said over his shoulder, “She's coming.” + +There was the click of a latch and the slithering of a sash, and then +out through the little dark frame came a head like a picture, with a +face all laughter, crowned by a cataract of streaming black hair, and +rounded off at the throat by a shadowy hint of the white frills of a +night-dress. + +“Kate,” said Pete again. + +She pretended to have come to the window merely to look out, and, like +a true woman, she made a little start at the sound of his voice, and a +little cry of dismay at the idea that he was so close beneath and had +taken her unawares. Then she peered down into the gloom and said, in a +tone of wondrous surprise, “It must be Pete, surely.” + +“And so it is, Kate,” said Pete, “and he couldn't take rest without +spaking to you once again.” + +“Ah!” she said, looking back and covering her eyes, and thinking of +Black Tom and the fairies. But suddenly the mischief of her sex came +dancing into her blood, and she could not help but plague the lad. “Have +you lost your way, Pete?” she asked, with an air of innocence. + +“Not my way, but myself, woman,” said Pete. + +“Lost yourself! Have the lad's wits gone moon-raking, I wonder? Are you +witched then, Pete?” she inquired, with vast solemnity. + +“Aw, witched enough. Kate----” + +“Poor fellow!” sighed Kate. “Did she strike you unknown and sudden?” + +“Unknown it was, Kirry, and sudden, too. Listen, though----” + +“Aw dear, aw dear! Was it old Mrs. Cowley of the Curragh? Did she turn +into a hare? Is it bitten you've been, Pete?” + +“Aw, yes, bitten enough. But, Kate----” + +“Then it was a dog, it's like. Is it flying from the water you are, +Pete?” + +“No, but flying _to_ the water, woman. Kate, I say----” + +“Is it burning they're doing for it?” + +“Burning and freezing both. Will you hear me, though? I'm going +away--hundreds and thousands of miles away.” + +Then from the window came a tone of great awe, uttered with face turned +upward as if to the last remaining star. + +“Poor boy! Poor boy! it's bitten he is, for sure.” + +“Then it's yourself that's bitten me. Kirry----” + +There was a little crow of gaiety. “Me? Am I the witch? You called me a +fairy in the road this evening.” + +“A fairy you are, girl, and a witch too; but listen, now----” + +“You said I was an angel, though, at the cowhouse gable; and an angel +doesn't bite.” + +Then she barked like a dog, and laughed a shrill laugh like a witch, and +barked again. + +But Pete could bear no more. “Go on, then; go on with your capers! Go +on!” he cried, in a voice of reproach. “It's not a heart that's at +you at all, girl, but only a stone. You see a man going away from the +island----” + +“From the island?” Kate gasped. + +“Middling down in the mouth, too, and plagued out of his life between +the ruck of you,” continued Pete; “but God forgive you all, you can't +help it.” + +“Did you say you were going out of the island, Pete?” + +“Coorse I did; but what's the odds? Africa, Kimberley, the Lord knows +where----” + +“Kimberley! Not Kimberley, Pete!” + +“Kimberley or Timbuctoo, what's it matter to the like of you? A man's +coming up in the morning to bid you good-bye before an early sailing, +and you're thinking of nothing but your capers and divilments.” + +“It's you to know what a girl's thinking, isn't it, Mr. Pete? And why +are you flying in my face for a word?” + +“Flying? I'm not flying. It's driven I am.” + +“Driven, Pete?” + +“Driven away by them that's thinking I'm not fit for you. Well, that's +true enough, but they shan't be telling me twice.” + +“They? Who are they, Pete?” + +“What's the odds? Flinging my mother at me, too--poor little mother! +And putting the bastard on me, it's like. A respectable man's girl isn't +going begging that she need marry a lad without a name.” + +There was a sudden ejaculation from the window-sash. “Who dared to say +that?” + +“No matter.” + +“Whoever they are, you can tell them, if it's me they mean, that, name +or no name, when I want to marry I'll marry the man I like.” + +“If I thought that now, Kitty----” + +“As for you, Mr. Pete, that's so ready with your cross words, you can +go to your Kimberley. Yes, go, and welcome; and what's more--what's +more----” + +But the voice of anger, in the half light overhead, broke down suddenly +into an inarticulate gurgle. + +“Why, what's this?” said Pete in a flurry. “You're not crying though, +Kate? Whatever am I saying to you, Kitty, woman? Here, here--bash me on +the head for a blockhead and an omathaun.” + +And Pete was clambering up the wall by the side of the dairy window. + +“Get down, then,” whispered Kate. + +Her wrath was gone in a moment, and Pete, being nearer to her now, could +see tears of laughter dancing in her eyes. + +“Get down, Pete, or I'll shut the window, I will--yes, I will.” And, to +show how much she was in earnest in getting out of his reach, she shut +up the higher sash and opened the lower one. + +“Darling!” cried Pete. + +“Hush! What's that?” Kate whispered, and drew back on her knees. + +“Is the door of the pig-sty open again?” said Pete. + +Kate drew a breath of relief. “It's only somebody snoring,” she said. + +“The ould man,” said Pete. “That's all serene! A good ould sheepdog, +that snaps more than, he bites, but he's best when he's sleeping--more +safer, anyway.” + +“What's the good of going away, Pete?” said Kate. “You'd have to make a +fortune to satisfy father.” + +“Others have done it, Kitty--why shouldn't I? Manx ones too--silver +kings and diamond kings, and the Lord knows what. No fear of me! When I +come back it's a queen you'll be, woman--my queen, anyway, with pigs and +cattle and a girl to wash and do for you.” + +“So that's how you'd bribe a poor girl is it? But you'd have to turn +religious, or father would never consent.” + +“When I come home again, Kitty, I'll be that religious you never seen. +I'll be just rolling in it. You'll hear me spaking like the Book of +Genesis and Abraham, and his sons, and his cousins; I'll be coming up +at night making love to you at the cowhouse door like the Acts of the +Apostles.” + +“Well, that will be some sort of courting, anyway. But who says I'll +be wanting it? Who says I'm willing for you to go away at all with the +notion that I must be bound to marry you when you come back?” + +“I do,” said Pete stoutly. + +“Oh, indeed, sir.” + +“Listen. I'll be working like a nigger out yonder, and making my pile, +and banking it up, and never seeing nothing but the goold and the +girls----” + +“My goodness! What do you say?” + +“Aw, never fear! I'm a one-woman man, Kate; but loving one is giving me +eyes for all. And you'll be waiting for me constant, and never giving a +skute of your little eye to them drapers and druggists from Ramsey----” + +“Not one of them? Not Jamesie Corrin, even--he's a nice boy, is +Jamesie.” + +“That dandy-divil with the collar? Hould your capers, woman!” + +“Nor young Ballawhaine--Ross Christian, you know?” + +“Ross Christian be--well, no; but, honour bright, you'll be saying, +'Peter's coming; I must be thrue!'” + +“So I've got my orders, sir, eh? It's all settled then, is it? Hadn't +you better fix the wedding-day and take out the banns, now that your +hand is in? I have got nothing to do with it, seemingly. Nobody asks +me.” + +“Whist, woman!” cried Pete. “Don't you hear it?” + +A cuckoo was passing over the house and calling. + +“It's over the thatch, Kate. 'Cuckoo! Cuckoo! Cuckoo!' Three times! +Bravo! Three times is a good Amen. Omen is it? Have it as you like, +love.” + +The stars had paled out by this time, and the dawn was coming up like a +grey vapour from the sea. + +“Ugh! the air feels late; I must be going in,” said Kate. + +“Only a bit of a draught from the mountains--it's not morning yet,” said +Pete. + +A bird called from out of the mist somewhat far away. + +“It is, though. That's the throstle up the glen,” said Kate. + +Another bird answered from the eaves of the house. + +“And what's that?” said Pete. “Was it yourself, Kitty? How straight your +voice is like the throstle's!” + +She hung her head at the sweet praise, but answered tartly, “How people +will be talking!” + +A dead white light came sweeping over the front of the house, and the +trees and the hedges, all quiet until then, began to shudder. Kate +shuddered too, and drew the frills closer about her throat. “I'm going, +Pete,” she whispered. + +“Not yet. It's only a taste of the salt from the sea,” said Pete. “The +moon's not out many minutes.” + +“Why, you goose, it's been gone these two hours. This isn't Jupiter, +where it's moonlight always.” + +“Always moonlight in Jubiter, is it?” said Pete. “My goodness! What +coorting there must be there!” + +A cock crowed from under the hen-roost, the dog barked indoors, and the +mare began to stamp in her stall. + +“When do you sail, Pete?” + +“First tide--seven o'clock.” + +“Time to be off, then. Good-bye!” + +“Hould hard--a word first.” + +“Not a word. I'm going back to bed. See, there's the sun coming up over +the mountains.” + +“Only a touch of red on the tip of ould Cronky's nose. Listen! Just to +keep them dandy-divils from plaguing you, I'll tell Phil to have an eye +on you while I'm away.” + +“Mr. Christian?” + +“Call him Philip, Kate. He's as free as free. No pride at all. Let him +take care of you till I come back.” + +“I'm shutting the window, Pete!” + +“Wait! Something else. Bend down so the ould man won't hear.” + +“I can't reach--what is it?” + +“Your hand, then; I'll tell it to your hand.” + +She hesitated a moment, and then dropped her hand over the window-sill, +and he clutched at it and kissed it, and pushed back the white sleeve +and ran up the arm with his lips as far as he could climb. + +“Another, my girl; take your time, one more--half a one, then.” + +She drew her arm back until her hand got up to his hand, and then she +said, “What's this? The mole on your finger still, Pete? You called me +a witch--now see me charm it away. Listen!--'Ping, ping, prash, Cur yn +cadley-jiargan ass my chass.'” + +She was uttering the Manx charm in a mock-solemn ululation when a bough +snapped in the orchard, and she cried, “What's that?” + +“It's Philip. He's waiting under the apple-tree,” said Pete. + +“My goodness me!” said Kate, and down went the window-sash. + +A moment later it rose again, and there was the beautiful young face in +its frame as before, but with the rosy light of the dawn on it. + +“Has he been there all the while?” she whispered. + +“What matter? It's only Phil.” + +“Good-bye! Good luck!” and then the window went down for good. + +“Time to go,” said Philip, still in his tall silk hat and his +knickerbockers. He had been standing alone among the dead brown fern, +the withering gorse, and the hanging brambles, gripping the apple-tree +and swallowing the cry that was bubbling up to his throat, but forcing +himself to look upon Pete's happiness, which was his own calamity, +though it was tearing his heart out, and he could hardly bear it. + +The birds were singing by this time, and Pete, going back, sang and +whistled with the best of them. + + + + +X. + +In the mists of morning, Grannie had awakened in her bed with the turfy +scraas of the thatch just visible above her, and the window-blind like +a hazy moon floating on the wall at her side. And, fixing her nightcap, +she had sighed and said, “I can't close my eyes for dreaming that the +poor lad has come to his end untimeously.” + +Cæsar yawned, and asked, “What lad?” + +“Young Pete, of course,” said Grannie. + +Cæsar _umpht_ and grunted. + +“We were poor ourselves when we began, father.” + +Grannie felt the glare of the old man's eye on her in the darkness. +“'Deed, we were; but people forget things. We had to borrow to buy our +big overshot wheel; we had, though. And when ould Parson Harrison sent +us the first boll of oats, we couldn't grind it for want of----” + +Cæsar tugged at the counterpane and said, “Will you lie quiet, woman, +and let a hard-working man sleep?” + +“Then don't be the young man's destruction, Cæsar.” + +Cæsar made a contemptuous snort, and pulled the bedclothes about his +head. + +“Aw, 'deed, father, but the girl might do worse. A fine, strapping lad. +And, dear heart, the cheerful face _at_ him! It's taking joy to +look at--like drawing water from a well! And the laugh _at_ the boy, +too--that joyful, it's as good to hear in the morning as six pigs at a +lit----” + +“Then marry the lad yourself, woman, and have done with it,” cried +Cæsar, and, so saying, he kicked out his leg, turned over to the wall, +and began to snore with great vigour. + + + + +XI. + +The tide was up in Ramsey Harbour, and rolling heavily on the shore +before a fresh sea-breeze with a cold taste of the salt in it. A steamer +lying by the quay was getting up steam; trucks were running on her +gangways, the clanking crane over her hold was working, and there was +much shouting of name, and ordering and protesting, and general tumult. +On the after-deck stood the emigrants for Kimberley, the Quarks from +Glen Rushen, and some of the young Gills from Castletown--stalwart lads, +bearing themselves bravely in the midst of a circle of their friends, +who talked and laughed to make them forget they were on the point of +going. + +Pete and Phil came up the quay, and were received by a shout of +incredulity from Quayle, the harbour-master. “What, are you going, too, +Mr. Philip?” Philip answered him “No,” and passed on to the ship. + +Pete was still in his stocking cap and Wellington boots, but he had a +monkey-jacket over his blue guernsey. Except for a parcel in a red print +handkerchief, this was all his kit and luggage. He felt a little +lost amid all the bustle, and looked helpless and unhappy. The busy +preparations on land and shipboard had another effect on Philip. He +sniffed the breeze off the bay and laughed, and said, “The sea's calling +me, Pete; I've half a mind to go with you.” + +Pete answered with a watery smile. His high spirits were failing him +at last. Five years were a long time to be away, if one built all one's +hopes on coming back. So many things might happen, so many chances might +befall. Pete had no heart for laughter. + +Philip had small mind for it, either, after the first rush of the salt +in his blood was over. He felt at some moments as if hell itself were +inside of him. What troubled him most was that he could not, for the +life of him, be sorry that Pete was leaving the island. Once or twice +since they left Sulby he had been startled by the thought that he hated +Pete. He knew that his lip curled down hard at sight of Pete's solemn +face. But Pete never suspected this, and the innocent tenderness of the +rough fellow was every moment beating it down with blows that cut like +ice and burnt like fire. + +They were standing by the forecastle head, and talking above the loud +throbbing of the funnel. + +“Good-bye, Phil; you've been wonderful good to me--better nor anybody in +the world. I've not been much of a chum for the like of you, either--you +that's college bred and ought to be the first gentry in the island if +everybody had his own. But you shan't be ashamed for me, neither--no you +shan't, so help me God! I won't be long away, Phil--maybe five years, +maybe less, and when I come back you'll be the first Manxman living. +No? But you will, though; you will, I'm telling you. No nonsense at all, +man. Lave it to me to know.” + +Philip's frosty blue eyes began to melt. + +“And if I come back rich, I'll be your ould friend again as much as a +common man may; and if I come back poor and disappointed and done for, +I'll not claim you to disgrace you; and if I never come back at all, +I'll be saying to myself in my dark hour somewhere, 'He'll spake up for +you at home, boy; _he'll_ not forget you.'” + +Philip could hear no more for the puffing of the steam and the clanking +of the chains. + +“Chut! the talk a man will put out when he's thinking of ould times gone +by!” + +The first bell rang on the bridge, and the harbour-master shouted, “All +ashore, there!” + +“Phil, there's one turn more I'll ask of you, and, if it's the last, +it's the biggest.” + +“What is it?” + +“There's Kate, you know. Keep an eye on the girl while I'm away. Take +a slieu round now and then, and put a sight on her. She'll not give a +skute at the heirs the ould man's telling of; but them young drapers and +druggists, they'll plague the life out of the girl. Bate them off, Phil. +They're not worth a fudge with their fists. But don't use no violence. +Just duck the dandy-divils in the harbour--that'll do.” + +“No harm shall come to her while you are away.” + +“Swear to it, Phil. Your word's your bond, I know that; but give me your +hand and swear to it--it'll be more surer.” + +Philip gave his hand and his oath, and then tried to turn away, for he +knew that his face was reddening. + +“Wait! There's another while your hand's in, Phil. Swear that nothing +and nobody shall ever come between us two.” + +“You know nothing ever will.” + +“But swear to it, Phil. There's bad tongues going, and it'll make me +more aisier. Whatever they do, whatever they say, friends and brothers +to the last?” + +Philip felt a buzzing in his head, and he was so dizzy that he could +hardly stand, but he took the second oath also. Then the bell rang +again, and there was a great hubbub. Gangways were drawn up, ropes +were let go, the captain called to the shore from the bridge, and the +blustering harbour-master called to the bridge from the shore. + +“Go and stand on the end of the pier, Phil--just aback of the +lighthouse--and I'll put myself at the stern. I want a friend's face to +be the last thing I see when I'm going away from the old home.”? + +Philip could bear no more. The hate in his heart was mastered. It was +under his feet. His flushed face was wet. + +The throbbing of the funnels ceased, and all that could be heard was +the running of the tide in the harbour and the wash of the waves on the +shore. Across the sea the sun came up boldly, “like a guest expected,” + and down its dancing water-path the steamer moved away. Over the land +old Bar-rule rose up like a sea king with hoar-frost on his forehead, +and the smoke began to lift from the chimneys of the town at his feet. + +“Good-bye, little island, good-bye! I'll not forget you. I'm getting +kicked out of you, but you've been a good ould mother to me, and, God +help me, I'll come back to you yet. So long, little Mona, s'long? I'm +laving you, but I'm a Manxman still.” + +Pete had meant to take off his stocking cap as they passed the +lighthouse, and to dash the tears from his eyes like a man. But all that +Philip could see from the end of the pier was a figure huddled up at the +stern on a coil of rope. + + + + +PART II. BOY AND GIRL. + + + + +I. + +Auntie Nan had grown uneasy because Philip was not yet started in life. +During the spell of his partnership with Pete she had protested and he +had coaxed, she had scolded and he had laughed. But when Pete was gone +she remembered her old device, and began to play on Philip through the +memory of his father. + +One day the air was full of the sea freshness of a beautiful Manx +November. Philip sniffed it from the porch after breakfast and then +gathered up his tackle for cod. + +“The boat again, Philip?” said Auntie Nan. “Then promise me to be back +for tea.” + +Philip gave his promise and kept it. When he returned after his day's +fishing the old lady was waiting for him in the little blue room which +she called her own. The sweet place was more than usually dainty and +comfortable that day. A bright fire was burning, and everything seemed +to be arranged so carefully and nattily. The table was laid with cups +and saucers, the kettle was singing on the jockey-bar, and Auntie +Nan herself, in a cap of black lace and a dress of russet silk with +flounces, was fluttering about with an odour of lavender and the light +gaiety of a bird. + +“Why, what's the meaning of this?” said Philip. + +And the sweet old thing answered, half nervously, half jokingly, “You +don't know? What a child it is, to be sure! So you don't remember what +day it is?” + +“What day? The fifth of Nov--oh, my birthday! I had clean forgotten it, +Auntie.” + +“Yes, and you are one-and-twenty for tea-time. That's why I asked you to +be home.” + +She poured out the tea, settled herself with her feet on the fender, +allowed the cat to establish itself on her skirt, and then, with a +nervous smile and a slight depression of the heart, she began on her +task. + +“How the years roll on, Philip! It's twenty years since I gave you +my first birthday present I wasn't here when you were born, dear. +Grandfather had forbidden me. Poor grandfather! But how I longed to come +and wash, and dress, and nurse my boy's boy, and call myself an auntie +aloud! Oh, dear me, the day I first saw you! Shall I ever forget it? +Grandfather and I were at Cowley, the draper's, when a beautiful young +person stepped in with a baby. A little too gay, poor thing, and that +was how I knew her.” + +“My mother?” + +“Yes, dear, and grandfather was standing with his back to the street. +I grow hot to this day when I remember, but she didn't seem afraid. She +nodded and smiled and lifted the muslin veil from the baby's face, and +said 'Who's he like, Miss Christian?' It was wonderful. You were asleep, +and it was the same for all the world as if your father had slept back +to be a baby. I was trembling fit to drop and couldn't answer, and then +your mother saw grandfather, and before I could stop her she had touched +him on the shoulder. He stood with his bad ear towards us, and his sight +was failing, too, but seeing the form of a lady beside him, he swept +round, and bowed low, and smiled and raised his hat, as his way was with +all women. Then your mother held the baby up and said quite gaily, 'Is +it one of the Ballures he is, Dempster, or one of the Ballawhaines?' +Dear heart when I think of it! Grandfather straightened himself up, +turned about, and was out on the street in an instant.” + +“Poor father!” said Philip. + +Auntie Nan's eyes brightened. + +“I was going to tell you of your first birthday, dearest. Grandfather +had gone then--poor grandfather!--and I had knitted you a little soft +cap of white wool, with a tassel and a pink bow. Your mother's father +was living still--Capt'n Billy, as they called him--and when I put the +cap on your little head, he cried out, 'A sailor every inch of him!' And +sure enough, though I had never thought it, a sailor's cap it was. +And Capt'n Billy put you on his knee, and looked at you sideways, and +slapped his thigh, and blew a cloud of smoke from his long pipe and +cried again, 'This boy is for a sailor, I'm telling you.' You fell +asleep in the old man's arms, and I carried you to your cot upstairs. +Your father followed me into the bedroom, and your mother was there +already dusting the big shells on the mantelpiece. Poor Tom! I see him +yet. He dropped his long white hand over the cot-rail, pushed back the +little cap and the yellow curls from your forehead, and said proudly, +'Ah, no, this head wasn't built for a sailor!' He meant no harm, +but--Oh, dear, Oh, dear!--your mother heard him, and thought he was +belittling her and hers. 'These qualities!' she cried, and slashed the +duster and flounced out of the room, and one of the shells fell with +a clank into the fender. Your father turned his face to the window. +I could have cried for shame that he should be ashamed before me. But +looking out on the sea,--the bay was very loud that day, I remember--he +said in his deep voice, that was like a mellow bell, and trembled +ratherly, 'It's not for nothing, Nannie, that the child has the forehead +of Napoleon. Only let God spare him and he'll be something some day, +when his father, with his broken heart and his broken brain, is dead and +gone, and the daisies cover him.'” + +Auntie Nan carried her point. That night Philip laid up his boat for the +winter, and next morning he set his face towards Ballawhaine with the +object of enlisting Uncle Peter's help in starting upon the profession +of the law. Auntie Nan went with him. She had urged him to the step +by the twofold plea that the Ballawhaine was his only male relative of +mature years, and that he had lately sent his own son Ross to study for +the bar in England. + +Both were nervous and uncertain on the way down; Auntie Nan talked +incessantly from under her poke-bonnet, thinking to keep up Philip's +courage. But when they came to the big gate and looked up at the turrets +through the trees, her memory went back with deep tenderness to the +days when the house had been her home, and she began to cry in silence. +Philip himself was not unmoved. This had been the birthplace and +birthright of his father. + +The English footman, in buff and scarlet, ushered them into the +drawing-room with the formality proper to strangers. + +To their surprise they found Ross there. He was sitting at the piano +strumming a music-hall ditty. As the door opened be shuffled to his +feet, shook hands distantly with Auntie Nan, and nodded his head to +Philip. + +The young man was by this time a sapling well fed from the old tree. +Taller than his father by many inches, broader, heavier, and larger in +all ways, with the slow eyes of a seal and something of a seal's face as +well. But with his father's sprawling legs and his father's levity and +irony of manner and of voice--a Manxman disguised out of all recognition +of race, and apeing the fashionable follies of the hour in London. + +Auntie Nan settled her umbrella, smoothed her gloves and her white front +hair, and inquired meekly if he was well. + +“Not very fit,” he drawled; “shouldn't be here if I were. But father +worried my life out until I came back to recruit.” + +“Perhaps,” said Auntie Nan, looking simple and sympathetic, “perhaps +you've been longing for home. It must be a great trial to a young man +to live in London for the first time. That's where a young woman has the +advantage--she needn't leave home, at all events. Then your lodgings, +perhaps they are not in the best part either.” + +“I used to have chambers in an Inn of Court----” + +Auntie Nan looked concerned. “I don't think I should like Philip to live +long at an inn,” she said. + +“But now I'm in rooms in the Hay market.” + +Auntie Nan looked relieved. + +“That must be better,” she said. “Noisy in the mornings, perhaps, but +your evenings will be quiet for study, I should think.” + +“Precisely,” said Boss, with a snigger, touching the piano again, and +Philip, sitting near the door, felt the palm of his hand itch for the +whole breadth of his cousin's cheek. + +Uncle Peter came in hurriedly, with short, nervous steps. His hair as +well as his eyebrows was now white, his eye was hollow, his cheeks were +thin, his mouth was restless, and he had lost some of his upper teeth, +he coughed frequently, he was shabbily dressed, and had the look of a +dying man. + +“Ah! it's you, Anne! and Philip, too. Good morning, Philip. Give the +piano a rest, Ross--that's a good lad. Well, Miss Christian, well!” + +“Philip came of age yesterday, Peter,” said Auntie Nan in a timid voice. + +“Indeed!” said the Ballawhaine, “then Ross is twenty next month. A +little more than a year and a month between them.” + +He scrutinised the old lady's face for a moment without speaking, and +then said, “Well?” + +“He would like to go to London to study for the bar,” faltered Auntie +Nan. + +“Why not the church at home?” + +“The church would have been my own choice, Peter, but his father----” + +The Ballawhaine crossed his leg over his knee. “His father was always +a man of a high stomach, ma'am,” he said. Then facing towards Philip, +“Your idea would be to return to the island.” + +“Yes,” said Philip. + +“Practice as an advocate, and push your way to insular preferment?” + +“My father seemed to wish it, sir,” said Philip. + +The Ballawhaine turned back to Auntie Nan. “Well, Miss Christian?” + +Auntie Nan fumbled the handle of her umbrella and began--“We were +thinking, Peter--you see we know so little--now if his father had been +living----” + +The Ballawhaine coughed, scratched with his nail on his cheek, and said, +“You wish me to put him with a barrister in chambers, is that it?” + +With a nervous smile and a little laugh of relief Auntie Nan signified +assent. + +“You are aware that a step like that costs money. How much have you got +to spend on it?” + +“I'm afraid, Peter----” + +“You thought I might find the expenses, eh?” + +“It's so good of you to see it in the right way, Peter.” + +The Ballawhaine made a wry face. “Listen,” he said dryly. “Ross has just +gone to study for the English bar.” + +“Yes,” said Auntie Nan eagerly, “and it was partly that----” + +“Indeed!” said the Ballawhaine, raising his eyebrows. “I calculate that +his course in London will cost me, one thing with another, more than a +thousand pounds.” + +Auntie Nan lifted her gloved hands in amazement. + +“That sum I am prepared to spend in order that my son, as an English +barrister, may have a better chance----” + +“Do you know, we were thinking of that ourselves, Peter?” said Auntie +Nan. + +“A better chance,” the Ballawhaine continued, “of the few places open in +the island than if he were brought up at the Manx bar only, which would +cost me less than half as much.” + +“Oh! but the money will come back to you, both for Ross and Philip,” + said Auntie Nan. + +The Ballawhaine coughed impatiently. “You don't read me,” he said +irritably. “These places are few, and Manx advocates are as thick as +flies in a glue-pot. For every office there must be fifty applicants, +but training counts for something, and influence for something, and +family for something.” + +Auntie Nan began to be penetrated as by a chill. + +“These,” said the Ballawhaine, “I bring to bear for Ross, that he may +distance all competitors. Do you read me now?” + +“Read you, Peter?” said Auntie Nan. + +The Ballawhaine fixed his hollow eye upon her, and said, “What do you +ask me to do? You come here and ask me to provide, prepare, and equip a +rival to my own son.” + +Auntie Nan had grasped his meaning at last. + +“But gracious me, Peter,” she said, “Philip is your own nephew, your own +brother's son.” + +The Ballawhaine rubbed the side of his nose with his lean forefinger, +and said, “Near is my shirt, but nearer is my skin.” + +Auntie Nan fixed her timid eyes upon him, and they grew brave in +their gathering indignation. “His father is dead, and he is poor and +friendless,” she said. + +“We've had differences on that subject before, mistress,” he answered. + +“And yet you begrudge him the little that would start him in life.” + +“My own has earlier claim, ma'am.” + +“Saving your presence, sir, let me tell you that every penny of the +money you are spending on Ross would have been Philip's this day if +things had gone different.” + +The Ballawhaine bit his lip. “Must I, for my sins, be compelled to put +an end to this interview?” + +He rose to go to the door. Philip rose also. + +“Do you mean it?” said Auntie Nan. “Would you dare to turn me out of the +house?” + +“Come, Auntie, what's the use?” said Philip. + +The Ballawhaine was drumming on the edge of the open door. “You are +right, young man,” he said, “a woman's hysteria is of _no_ use.” + +“That will do, sir,” said Philip in a firm voice. + +The Ballawhaine put his hand familiarly on Philip's shoulder. “Try +Bishop Wilson's theological college, my friend; its cheap and----” + +“Take your hand from him, Peter Christian,” cried Auntie Nan. Her eyes +flashed, her cheeks were aflame, her little gloved hands were clenched. +“You made war between his father and your father, and when I would have +made peace you prevented me. Your father is dead, and your brother is +dead, and both died in hate that might have died in love, only for the +lies you told and the deceit you practised. But they have gone where the +mask falls from all faces, and they have met before this, eye to eye, +and hand to hand. Yes, and they are looking down on you now, Peter +Christian, and they know you at last for what you are and always have +been--a deceiver and a thief.” + +By an involuntary impulse the Ballawhaine turned his eyes upward to the +ceiling while she spoke, as if he had expected to see the ghosts of his +father and his brother threatening him. + +“Is the woman mad at all?” he cried; and the timid old lady, lifted out +of herself by the flame of her anger, blazed at him again with a tongue +of fire. + +“You have done wrong, Peter Christian, much wrong; you've done wrong all +your days, and whatever your motive, God will find it out, and on that +secret place he will bring your punishment. If it was only greed, you've +got your wages; but no good will they bring to you, for another will +spend them, and you will see them wasted like water from the ragged +rock. And if it was hate as well, you will live till it comes back +on your own head like burning coal. I know it, I feel it,” she cried, +sweeping into the hall, “and sorry I am to say it before your own son, +who ought to honour and respect his father, but can't; no, he can't and +never will, or else he has a heart to match your own in wickedness, and +no bowels of compassion at him either.” + +“Come, Auntie, come,” said Philip, putting his arm about the old +lady's waist. But she swerved round again to where the Ballawhaine came +slinking behind him. + +“Turn me out of the house, will you?” she cried. “The place where I +lived fifteen years, and as mistress, too, until your evil deeds made +you master. Many a good cry I've had that it's only a woman I am, and +can do nothing on my own head. But I would rather be a woman that hasn't +a roof to cover her than a man that can't warm to his own flesh and +blood. Don't think I begrudge you your house, Peter Christian, though +it was my old home, and I love it, for all I'm shown no respect in it I +would have you to know, sir, that it isn't our houses we live in after +all, but our hearts--our hearts, Peter Christian--do you hear me?--our +hearts, and yours is full of darkness and dirt--and always will be, +always will be.” + +“Come, come, Auntie, come,” cried Philip again, and the sweet old +thing, too gentle to hurt a fly, turned on him also with the fury of a +wild-cat. + +“Go along yourself with your 'come' and 'come' and 'come.' Say less and +do more.” + +With that final outburst she swept down the steps and along the path, +leaving Philip three paces behind, and the Ballawhaine with a terrified +look under the stuffed cormorant in the fanlight above the open door. + +The fiery mood lasted her half way home, and then broke down in a +torrent of tears. + +“Oh dear! oh dear!” she cried. “I've been too hasty. After all, he is +your only relative. What shall I do now? Oh, what shall I do now?” + +Philip was walking steadily half a step behind, and he had never once +spoken since they left Ballawhaine. + +“Pack my bag to-night, Auntie,” said he with the voice of a man; “I +shall start for Douglas by the coach to-morrow morning.” + +He sought out the best known of the Manx advocates, a college friend of +his father's, and said to him, “I've sixty pounds a year, sir, from my +mother's father, and my aunt has enough of her own to live on. Can I +afford to pay your premium?” + +The lawyer looked at him attentively for a moment, and answered, “No, +you can't,” and Philip's face began to fall. + +“But I'll take you the five years for nothing, Mr. Christian,” the wise +man added, “and if you suit me, I'll give you wages after two.” + + + + +II. + +Philip did not forget the task wherewith Pete had charged him. It is a +familiar duty in the Isle of Man, and he who discharges it is known by +a familiar name. They call him the _Dooiney Molla_--literally, the +“man-praiser;” and his primary function is that of an informal, +unmercenary, purely friendly and philanthropic matchmaker, introduced +by the young man to persuade the parents of the young woman that he is a +splendid fellow, with substantial possessions or magnificent prospects, +and entirely fit to marry her. But he has a secondary function, less +frequent, though scarcely less familiar; and it is that of lover by +proxy, or intended husband by deputy, with duties of moral guardianship +over the girl while the man himself is off “at the herrings,” or away +“at the mackerel,” or abroad on wider voyages. + +This second task, having gone through the first with dubious success, +Philip discharged with conscientious zeal. The effects were peculiar. +Their earliest manifestations were, as was most proper, on Philip +and Kate themselves. Philip grew to be grave and wondrous solemn, for +assuming the tone of guardian lifted his manners above all levity. Kate +became suddenly very quiet and meek, very watchful and modest, soft of +voice and most apt to blush. The girl who had hectored it over Pete and +played little mistress over everybody else, grew to be like a dove under +the eye of Philip. A kind of awe fell on her whenever he was near. She +found it sweet to listen to his words of wisdom when he discoursed, and +sweeter still to obey his will when he gave commands. The little wistful +head was always turning in his direction; his voice was like joy-bells +in her ears; his parting how under his lifted hat remained with her as +a dream until the following day. She hardly knew what great change had +been wrought in her, and her people at home were puzzled. + +“Is it not very well you are, Kirry, woman?” said Grannie. + +“Well enough, mother; why not?” said Kate. + +“Is it the toothache that's plaguing you?” + +“No.” + +“Then maybe it's the new hat in the window at Miss Clu-cas's?” + +“Hould your tongue, woman,” whispered Cæsar behind the back of his hand. +“It's the Spirit that's working on the girl. Give it lave, mother; give +it lave.” + +“Give it fiddlesticks,” said Nancy Joe. “Give it brimstone and treacle +and a cupful of wormwood and camomile.” + +When Philip and Kate were together, their talk was all of Pete. It was +“Pete likes this,” and “Pete hates that,” and “Pete always says so +and so.” That was their way of keeping up the recollection of Pete's +existence; and the uses they put poor Pete to were many and peculiar. + +One night “The Manx Fairy” was merry and noisy with a “Scaltha,” a +Christmas supper given by the captain of a fishing-boat to the crew that +he meant to engage for the season. Wives, sweethearts, and friends were +there, and the customs and superstitions of the hour were honoured. + +“Isn't it the funniest thing in the world, Philip?” giggled Kate from +the back of the door, and a moment afterwards she was standing alone +with him in the lobby, looking demurely down at his boots. + +“I suppose I ought to apologise.” + +“Why so?” + +“For calling you that.” + +“Pete calls me Philip. Why shouldn't you?” + +The furtive eyes rose to the buttons of his waistcoat. “Well, no; there +can't be much harm in calling you what Pete calls you, can there? But +then--” + +“Well?” + +“He calls me Kate.” + +“Do you think he would like me to do so?” + +“I'm sure he would.” + +“Shall we, then?” + +“I wonder!” + +“Just for Pete's sake?” + +“Just.” + +“Kate!” + +“Philip!” + +They didn't know what they felt. It was something exquisite, something +delicious; so sweet, so tender, they could only laugh as if some one had +tickled them. + +“Of course, we need not do it except when we are quite by ourselves,” + said Kate. + +“Oh no, of course not, only when we are quite alone,” said Philip. + +Thus they threw dust into each other's eyes, and walked hand in hand on +the edge of a precipice. + +The last day of the old year after Pete's departure found Philip +attending to his duty. + +“Are you going to put the new year in anywhere, Philip?” said Kate, from +the door of the porch. + +“I should be the first-foot here, only I'm no use as a qualtagh,” said +Philip. + +“Why not?” + +“I'm a fair man, and would bring you no luck, you know.” + +“Ah!” + +There was silence for a moment, and then Kate cried “_I_ know.” + +“Yes?” + +“Come for Pete--he's dark enough, anyway.” + +Philip was much impressed. “That's a good idea,” he said gravely. “Being +qualtagh for Pete is a good idea. His first New Year from home, too, +poor fellow!” + +“Exactly,” said Kate. + +“Shall I, then?” + +“I'll expect you at the very stroke of twelve.” + +Philip was going off. “And, Philip!” + +“Yes?” + +Then a low voice, so soft, so sweet, so merry, came from the doorway +into the dark, “I'll be standing at the door of the dairy.” + +Philip began to feel alarm, and resolved to take for the future a +lighter view of his duties. He would visit “The Manx Fairy” less +frequently. As soon as the Christmas holidays were over he would devote +himself to his studies, and come back to Sulby no more for half a year. +But the Manx Christmas is long. It begins on the 24th of December, and +only ends for good on the 6th of January. In the country places, which +still preserve the old traditions, the culminating day is Twelfth Day. +It is then that they “cut off the fiddler's head,” and play valentines, +which they call the “Goggans.” The girls set a row of mugs on the hearth +in front of the fire, put something into each of them as a symbol of a +trade, and troop out to the stairs. Then the boys change the order of +the mugs, and the girls come back blindfold, one by one, to select their +goggans. According to the goggans they lay hands on, so will be the +trades of their husbands. + +At this game, played at “The Manx Fairy” on the last night of Philip's +holiday, Csesar being abroad on an evangelising errand, Kate was +expected to draw water, but she drew a quill. + +“A pen! A pen!” cried the boys. “Who says the girl is to marry a sailor? +The ship isn't built that's to drown her husband.” + +“Good-night all,” said Philip. + +“Good-night, Mr. Christian, good-night, sir,” said the boys. + +Kate slipped after him to the door. “Going so early, Philip?” + +“I've to be back at Douglas to-morrow morning,” said Philip. + +“I suppose we shan't see you very soon?” + +“No, I must set to work in earnest now.” + +“A fortnight--a month may be?” + +“Yes, and six months--I intend to do nothing else for half a year.” + +“That's a long time, isn't it, Philip?” + +“Not so long as I've wasted.” + +“Wasted? So you call it wasted? Of course, it's nothing to me--but +there's your aunt----” + +“A man can't always be dangling about women,” said Philip. + +Kate began to laugh. + +“What are you laughing at?” + +“I'm so glad I'm a girl,” said Kate. + +“Well, so am I,” said Philip. + +“Are you?” + +It came at his face like a flash of lightning, and Philip stammered, “I +mean--that is--you know--what about Pete?” + +“Oh, is that all? Well, good-night, if you must go. Shall I bring you +the lantern? No need? Starlight, is it? You can see your way to the gate +quite plainly? Very well, if you don't want showing. Good-night!” + +The last words, in an injured tone, were half lost behind the closing +door. + +But the heart of a girl is a dark forest, and Kate had determined that, +work or no work, so long a spell as six months Philip should not be +away. + + + + +III. + +One morning in the late spring there came to Douglas a startling and +most appalling piece of news---Ross Christian was constantly seen at +“The Manx Fairy.” On the evening of that day Philip reappeared at Sulby. +He had come down in high wrath, inventing righteous speeches by the +way on plighted troths and broken pledges. Ross was there in lacquered +boots, light kid gloves, frock coat, and pepper and salt trousers, +leaning with elbow on the counter, that he might talk to Kate, who +was serving. Philip had never before seen her at that task, and his +indignation was extreme. He was more than ever sure that Grannie was a +simpleton and Cæsar a brazen hypocrite. + +Kate nodded gaily to him as he entered, and then continued her +conversation with Ross. There was a look in her eyes that was new to +him, and it caused him to change his purpose. He would not be indignant, +he would be cynical, he would be nasty, he would wait his opportunity +and put in with some cutting remark. So, at Cæsar's invitation and +Grannie's welcome, he pushed through the bar-room to the kitchen, +exchanged salutations, and then sat down to watch and to listen. + +The conversation beyond the glass partition was eager and enthusiastic. +Ross was fluent and Kate was vivacious. + +“My friend Monty?” + +“Yes; who is Monty?” + +“He's the centre of the Fancy.” + +“The Fancy!” + +“Ornaments of the Ring, you know. Come now, surely you know the Ring, my +dear. His rooms in St. James's Street are full of them every night. All +sorts, you know--featherweights, and heavy-weights, and greyhounds. And +the faces! My goodness, you should see them. Such worn-out old images. +Knowledge boxes all awry, mouths crooked, and noses that have had the +upper-cut. But good men all; good to take their gruel, you know. Monty +will have nothing else about him. He was Tom Spring's packer. Never +heard of Tom Spring? Tom of Bedford, the incorruptible, you know, only +he fought cross that day. Monty lost a thousand, and Tom keeps a public +in Holborn now with pictures of the Fancy round the walls.” + +Then Kate, with a laugh, said something which Philip did not catch, +because Cæsar was rustling the newspaper he was reading. + +“Ladies come?” said Ross. “Girls at Monty's suppers? Rather! what should +you think? Cleopatra--but you ought to be there. I must be getting off +myself very soon. There's a supper coming off next week at Handsome +Honey's. Who's Honey? Proprietor of a night-house in the Haymarket. +Night-house? You come and see, my dear.” + +Cæsar dropped the newspaper and looked across at Philip. The gaze was +long and embarrassing, and, for want of better conversation, Philip +asked Cæsar if he was thinking. + +“Aw, thinking, thinking, and thinking again, sir,” said Cæsar. Then, +drawing his chair nearer to Philip's, he added, in a half whisper, “I'm +getting a bit of a skute into something, though. See yonder? They're +calling his father a miser. The man's racking his tenants and starving +his land. But I believe enough the young brass lagh (a weed) is choking +the ould grain.” + +Cæsar, as he spoke, tipped his thumb over his shoulder in the direction +of Ross, and, seeing this, Ross interrupted his conversation with Kate +to address himself to her father. + +“So you've been reading the paper, Mr. Cregeen?” + +“Aw, reading and reading,” said Cæsar grumpily. Then in another tone, +“You're home again from London, sir? Great doings yonder, they're +telling me. Battles, sir, great battles.” + +Ross elevated his eyebrows. “Have you heard of them then?” he asked. + +“Aw, heard enough,” said Cæsar, “meetings, and conferences, and +conventions, and I don't know what.” + +“Oh, oh, I see,” said Ross, with a look at Kate. + +“They're doing without hell in England now-a-days--that's a quare thing, +sir. Conditional immorality they're calling it--the singlerest thing I +know. Taking hell away drops the tailboard out of a man's religion, eh?” + +The time for closing came, and Philip had waited in vain. Only one cut +had come his way, and that had not been his own. As he rose to go, +Kate had said, “We didn't expect to see you again for six months, Mr. +Christian.” + +“So it seems,” said Philip, and Kate laughed a little, and that was all +the work of his evening, and the whole result of his errand. + +Cæsar was waiting for him in the porch. His face was white, and it +twitched visibly. It was plain to see that the natural man was fighting +in Cæsar. “Mr. Christian, sir,” said he, “are you the gentleman that +came here to speak to me for Peter Quilliam?” + +“I am,” said Philip. + +“Then do you remember the ould Manx saying, 'Perhaps the last dog may be +catching the hare?'” + +“Leave it to me, Mr. Cregeen,” said Philip through his teeth. + +Half a minute afterwards he was swinging down the dark road homewards, +by the side of Ross, who was drawling along with his cold voice. + +“So you've started on your light-weight handicap, Philip. Father was +monstrous unreasonable that day. Seemed to think I was coming back here +to put my shoulder out for your high bailiffships and bum-bailiffships +and heaven knows what. You're welcome to the lot for me, Philip. That +girl's wonderful, though. It's positively miraculous, too; she's the +living picture of a girl of my friend Montague's. Eyes, hair, that +nervous movement of the mouth--everything. Old man looked glum enough, +though. Poor little woman. I suppose she's past praying for. The old +hypocrite will hold her like a dove in the claws of a buzzard hawk till +she throws herself away on some Manx omathaun. It's the way with half +these pretty creatures--they're wasted.” + +Philip's blood was boiling. “Do you call it being wasted when a good +girl is married to an honest man?” he asked. + +“I do; because a girl like this can never marry the right man. The man +who is worthy of her cannot marry her, and the man who marries her +isn't worthy of her. It's like this, Philip. She's young, she's pretty, +perhaps beautiful, has manners and taste, and some refinement. The +man of her own class is clumsy and ignorant, and stupid and poor. +She doesn't want him, and the man she does want the man she's fit +for--daren't marry her; it would be social suicide.” + +“And so,” said Philip bitterly, “to save the man above from social +suicide, the girl beneath must choose moral death--is that it?” + +Ross laughed. “Do you know I thought old Jeremiah was at you in the +corner there, Philip. But look at it straight. Here's a girl like that. +Two things are open to her--two only. Say she marries your Manx fellow, +what follows? A thatched cottage three fields back from the mountain +road, two rooms, a cowhouse, a crock, a dresser, a press, a form, a +three-legged stool, an armchair, and a clock with a dirty face, hanging +on a nail in the wall. Milking, weeding, digging, ninepence a day, and a +can of buttermilk, with a lump of butter thrown in. Potatoes, herrings, +and barley bonnag. Year one, a baby, a boy; year two, another baby, a +girl; year three, twins; year four, barefooted children squalling, +dirty house, man grumbling, woman distracted, measles, hooping-cough; a +journey at the tail of a cart to the bottom of the valley, and the awful +words 'I am the----'” + +“Hush man!” said Philip. They were passing Lezayre churchyard. When they +had left it behind, he added, with a grim curl of the lip, which was +lost in the darkness, “Well, that's one side. What's the other?” + +“Life,” said Ross. “Short and sweet, perhaps. Everything she wants, +everything she can wish for--five years, four years, three years--what +matter?” + +“And then?” + +“Every one for himself and God for us all, my boy. She's as happy as the +day while it lasts, lifts her head like a rosebud in the sun----” + +“Then drops it, I suppose, like a rose-leaf in the mud.” Ross laughed +again. “Yes, it's a fact, old Jeremiah _has_ been at you, Philip. Poor +little Kitty----” + +“Keep the girl's name out of it, if you please.” + +Ross gave a long whistle. “I was only saying the poor little woman----” + +“It's damnable, and I'll have no more of it.” + +“There's no duty on speech, I hope, in your precious Isle of Man.” + +“There is, though,” said Philip, “a duty of decency and honour, and +to name that girl, foolish as she is, in the same breath with your +women--But here, listen to me. Best tell you now, so there may be no +mistake and no excuse. Miss Cregeen is to be married to a friend of +mine. I needn't say who he is--he comes close enough to you at all +events. When he's at home, he's able to take care of his own affairs; +but while he's abroad I've got to see that no harm comes to his promised +wife. I mean to do it, too. Do you understand me, Ross? I mean to do it. +Good night!” + +They were at the gate of Ballawhaine by this time, and Ross went through +it giggling. + + + + +IV. + +The following evening found Philip at “The Manx Fairy” again. Ross was +there as usual, and he was laughing and talking in a low tone with Kate. +This made Philip squirm on his chair, but Kate's behaviour tortured +him. Her enjoyment of the man's jests was almost uproarious. She was +signalling to him and peering up at him gaily. Her conduct disgusted +Philip. It seemed to him an aggravation of her offence that as often as +he caught the look of her face there was a roguish twinkle in the eye on +his side, and a deliberate cast in his direction. This open disregard +of the sanctity of a pledged word, this barefaced indifference to the +presence of him who stood to represent it, was positively indecent. This +was what women were! Deceit was bred in their bones. + +It added to Philip's gathering wrath that Cæsar, who sat in +shirt-sleeves making up his milling accounts from slates ciphered with +crosses, and triangles, and circles, and half circles, was lifting his +eyes from time to time to look first at them and then at him, with an +expression of contempt. + +At a burst of fresh laughter and a shot of the bright eyes, Philip +surged up to his feet, thrust himself between Ross and Kate, turned his +back on him and his face to her, and said in a peremptory voice, “Come +into the parlour instantly--I have something to say to you.” + +“Oh, indeed!” said Kate. + +But she came, looking mischievous and yet demure, with her head down but +her eyes peering under their long upper lashes. + +“Why don't you send this fellow about his business?” said Philip. + +Kate looked up in blank surprise. “What fellow?” she said. + +“What fellow?” said Philip, “why, this one that is shillyshallying with +you night after night.” + +“You can never mean your own cousin, Philip?” said Kate. + +“More's the pity if he is my cousin, but he's no fit company for you.” + +“I'm sure the gentleman is polite enough.” + +“So's the devil himself.” + +“He can behave and keep his temper, anyway.” + +“Then it's the only thing he can keep. He can't keep his character or +his credit or his honor, and you should not encourage him.” + +Kate's under lip began to show the inner half. “Who says I encourage +him?” + +“I do.” + +“What right have you?” + +“Haven't I seen you with my own eyes?” + +Kate grew defiant. “Well, and what if you have?” + +“Then you are a jade and a coquette.” + +The word hissed out like steam from a kettle. Kate saw it coming and +took it full in the face. She felt an impulse to scream with laughter, +so she seized her opportunity and cried. + +Philip's temper began to ebb. “That man would be a poor bargain, Kate, +if he were twenty times the heir of Ballawhaine. Can't you gather +from his conversation what his life and companions are? Of course it's +nothing to me, Kate----” + +“No, it's nothing to you,” whimpered Kate, from behind both hands. + +“I've no right----” + +“Of course not; you've no right,” said Kate, and she stole a look +sideways. + +“Only----” + +Philip did not see the glance that came from the corner of Kate's eye. + +“When a girl forgets a manly fellow, who happens to be abroad, for the +first rascal that comes along with his dirty lands--” + +Down went the hands with an impatient fling. “What are his lands to me?” + +“Then it's my duty as a friend----” + +“Duty indeed! Just what every old busybody says.” + +Philip gripped her wrist. “Listen to me. If you don't send this man +packing----” + +“You are hurting me. Let go my arm.” + +Philip flung it aside and said, “What do I care?” + +“Then why do you call me a coquette?” + +“Do as you like.” + +“So I will. Philip! Philip! Phil! He's gone.” + +It was twenty miles by coach and rail from Douglas to Sulby, but +Philip was back at “The Manx Fairy” the next evening also. He found a +saddle-horse linked to the gate-post and Ross inside the house with a +riding-whip in his hand, beating the leg of his riding-breeches. + +When Philip appeared, Kate began to look alarmed, and Ross to look ugly. +Cæsar, who was taking his tea in the ingle, was having an unpleasant +passage with Grannie in side-breaths by the fire. + +“Bad, bad, a notorious bad liver and dirty with the tongue,” said Cæsar. + +“Chut, father!” said Grannie. “The young man's civil enough, and girls +will be girls. What's a word or a look or a laugh when you're young and +have a face that's fit for anything.” + +“Better her face should be pitted with smallpox than bring her to the +pit of hell,” said Cæsar. “All flesh is grass: the grass withereth, the +flower fadeth.” + +Nancy Joe came from the dairy at that moment. “Gracious me I did you see +that now?” she said. “I wonder at Kitty. But it's the way of the men, +smiling and smiling and maning nothing.” + +“Hm! They mane a dale,” growled Cæsar. + +Ross had recovered from his uneasiness at Philip's entrance, and was +engaged in some narration whereof the only words that reached the +kitchen were _I know_ and _I know_ repeated frequently. + +“You seem to know a dale, sir,” shouted Cæsar; “do you know what it is +to be saved?” + +There was silence for a moment, and then Ross, polishing his massive +signet ring on his corduroy waistcoat, said, “Is that the old +gentleman's complaint, I wonder?” + +“My husband is a local preacher and always strong for salvation,” said +Grannie by way of peace. + +“Is that all?” said Ross. “I thought perhaps he had taken more wine than +the sacrament.” + +“You're my cross, woman,” muttered Cæsar, “but no cross no crown.” + +“Lave women's matters alone, father; it'll become you better,” said +Grannie. + +“Laugh as you like, Mistress Cregeen; there's One above, there's One +above.” + +Ross had resumed his conversation with Kate, who was looking frightened. +And listening with all his ears, Philip caught the substance of what was +said. + +“I'm due back by this time. There's the supper at Handsome Honey's, +not to speak of the everlasting examinations. But somehow I can't tear +myself away. Why not? Can't you guess? No? Not a notion? I would go +to-morrow--Kitty, a word in your ear----” + +“I believe in my heart that man is for kissing her,” said Cæsar. “If he +does, then by--he's done it! Hould, sir.” + +Cæsar had risen to his feet, and in a moment the house was in an uproar. +Ross lifted his head like a cock. “Were you speaking to me, mister?” he +asked. + +“I was, and don't demane yourself like that again,” said Cæsar. + +“Like what?” said Ross. + +“Paying coort to a girl that isn't fit for you.” + +Ross lifted his hat, “Do you mean this young lady?” + +“No young lady at all, sir, but the daughter of a plain, respectable man +that isn't going to see her fooled. Your hat to your head, sir. You'll +be wanting it for the road.” + +“Father!” cried Kate, in a voice of fear. + +Cæsar turned his rough shoulder and said, “Go to your room, ma'am, and +keep it for a week.” + +“You may go,” said Ross. “I'll spare the old simpleton for your sake, +Kate.” + +“You'll spare me, sir?” cried Cæsar. “I've seen the day--but thank +the Lord for restraining grace! Spare me? If you had said as much +five-and-twenty years ago, sir, your head would have gone ringing +against the wall.” + +“I'll spare you no more, then,” said Ross. “Take that--and that.” + +Amid screams from the women, two sounding blows fell on Cæsar's face. At +the next instant Philip was standing between the two men. + +“Come this way,” he said, addressing Ross. + +“If I like,” Ross answered. + +“This way, I tell you,” said Philip. + +Ross snapped his fingers. “As you please,” he said, and then followed +Philip out of the house. + +Kate had run upstairs in terror, but five minutes afterwards she was +on the road, with a face full of distress, and a shawl over head and +shoulders. At the bridge she met Kelly, the postman. + +“Which way have they gone,” she panted, “the young Ballawhaine and +Philip Christian?” + +“I saw them heading down to the Curragh,” said Kelly, and Kate in the +shawl, flew like a bird over the ground in that direction. + + + + +V. + +The two young men went on without a word. Philip walked with long +strides three paces in front, with head thrown back, pallid face and +contracted features, mouth firmly shut, arms stiff by his side, and +difficult and audible breathing. Ross slouched behind with an air of +elaborate carelessness, his horse beside him, the reins over its head +and round his arm, the riding-whip under his other arm-pit, and both his +hands deep in the breeches pockets. There was no road the way they +went, but only a cart track, interrupted here and there by a gate, and +bordered by square turf pits half full of water. + +The days were long and the light was not yet failing. Beyond the gorse, +the willows, the reeds, the rushes and the sally bushes of the flat +land, the sun was setting over a streak of gold on the sea. They had +left behind them the smell of burning turf, of crackling sticks, +of fish, and of the cowhouse, and were come into the atmosphere of +flowering gorse and damp scraa soil and brine. + +“Far enough, aren't we?” shouted Ross, but Philip pushed on. He drew up +at last in an open space, where the gorse had been burnt away and its +black remains desolated the surface and killed the odours of life. There +was not a house near, not a landmark in sight, except a windmill on +the sea's verge, and the ugly tower of a church, like the funnel of a +steamship between sea and sky. + +“We're alone at last,” he said hoarsely. + +“We are,” said Ross, interrupting the whistling of a tune, “and now that +you've got me here, perhaps you'll be good enough to tell me what we've +come for.” + +Philip made no more answer than to strip himself of his coat and +waistcoat. + +“You're never going to make a serious business of this stupid affair?” + said Ross, leaning against the horse and slapping the sole of one foot +with the whip. + +“Take off your coat,” said Philip in a thick voice. + +“Can I help it if a pretty girl----” began Ross. + +“Will you strip?” cried Philip. + +Ross laughed. “Ah! now I remember our talk of the other night. But you +don't mean to say,” he said, flipping at the flies at the horse's head, +“that because the little woman is forgetting the curmudgeon that's +abroad----” + +Philip strode up to him with clenched hands and quivering lips and said, +“Will you fight?” + +Ross laughed again, but the blood was in his face, and he said +tauntingly, “I wouldn't distress myself, man. Daresay I'll be done with +the girl before the fellow----” + +“You're a scoundrel,” cried Philip, “and if you won't stand up to +me----” + +Ross flung away his whip. “If I must, I must,” he said, and then threw +the horse's reins round the charred arm of a half-destroyed gorse tree. + +A minute afterwards the young men stood face to face. + +“Stop,” said Ross, “let me tell you first; it's only fair. Since I went +up to London I've learnt a thing or two. I've stood up before men that +can strip a picture; I've been opposite talent and I can peck a bit, but +I've never heard that you can stop a blow.” + +“Are you ready?” cried Philip. + +“As you will. You shall have one round, you'll want no more.” + +The young men looked badly matched. Ross, in riding-breeches and shirt, +with red bullet head and sprawling feet, arms like an oak and veins like +willow boughs. Philip in shirt and knickerbockers, with long fair hair, +quivering face, and delicate figure. It was strength and some skill +against nerve alone. + +Like a rush of wind Philip came on, striking right and left, and was +driven back by a left-hand body-blow. + +“There, you've got it,” said Ross, smiling benignly. “Didn't I tell you? +That's old Bristol Bull to begin with.” + +Philip rushed on again, and came back with a smashing blow that cut his +nether lip. + +“You've got a second,” said Ross. “Have you had enough?” + +Philip did not hear, but sprang fiercely at Ross once more. The next +instant he was on the ground. Then Ross took on a manner of utter +contempt. “I can't keep on flipping at you all night.” + +“Mock me when you've beaten me,” said Philip, and he was on his feet +again, somewhat blown, but fresh as to spirit and doggedly resolute. + +“Toe the scratch, then,” said Ross. “I must say you're good at your +gruel.” + +Philip flung himself on his man a third time, and fell more heavily than +before, under a flush hit that seemed to bury itself in his chest. + +“I can't go on fighting a man that's as good for nothing as my old +grandmother,” said Ross. + +But his contempt was abating; he was growing uneasy; Philip was before +him as fierce as ever. + +“Fight your equal,” he cried. + +“I'll fight you,” growled Philip. + +“You're not fit. Give it up. And look, the dark is falling.” + +“There's enough daylight yet. Come on.” + +“Nobody is here to shame you.” + +“Come on, I say.” + +Philip did not wait, but sprang on his man like a tiger. Ross met his +blow, dodged, feinted; they gripped, swinging to and fro; there was a +struggle, and Philip fell again with a dull thud against the ground. + +“Will you stop now?” said Ross. + +“No, no, no,” cried Philip, leaping to his feet. + +“I'll eat you up. I'm a glutton, I can tell you.” But his voice +trembled, and Philip, blind with passion, laughed. + +“You'll be hurt,” said Ross. + +“What of that?” said Philip. + +“You'll be killed.” + +“I'm willing.” + +Ross tried to laugh mockingly, but the hoarse gurgle choked in his +throat. He began to tremble. “This man doesn't know when he's mauled,” + he muttered, and after a loud curse he stood up afresh, with a craven +and shifty look. His blows fell like scorching missiles, but Philip took +them like a rock scoured with shingle, raining blood like water, but +standing firm. + +“What's the use?” cried Ross; “drop it.” + +“I'll drop myself first,” said Philip. + +“If you won't give it up, I will,” said Ross. + +“You shan't,” said Philip. + +“Take your victory if you like.” + +“I won't.” + +“Say you've licked me.” + +“I'll do it first,” said Philip. + +Ross laughed long and riotously, but he was trembling like a whipped +cur. With a blob of foam on his lips he came up, collecting all his +strength, and struck Philip a blow on the forehead that fell with the +sound of a hammer on a coffin. + +“Are you done?” he snuffled. + +“No, by God,” cried Philip, black as ink with the burnt gorse from the +ground, except where the blood ran red on him. + +“This man means to kill me,” mumbled Ross. He looked round shiftily, and +said, “I mean no harm by the girl.” + +“You're a liar!” cried Philip. + +With a glance of deep malignity, Ross closed with Philip again. It was +now a struggle of right with wrong as well as nerve with strength. +The sun had set under the sea, the sally bushes were shivering in the +twilight, a flight of rooks were screaming overhead. Blows were no more +heard. Ross gripped Philip in a venomous embrace, and dragged him on +to one knee. Philip rose, Ross doubled round his waist, pushing him +backward, and fell heavily on his breast, shouting with the growl of a +beast, “You'll fight me, will you? Get up, get up!” + +Philip did not rise, and Ross began dragging and lunging at him with +brutal ferocity, when suddenly, where he bent double, a blow fell on his +ear from behind, another and another, a hand gripped his shirt collar +and choked him, and a voice cried, “Let go, you brute, let go, let go.” + +Ross dropped Philip and swung himself round to return the attack. + +It was the girl. “Oh, it's you, is it?” he panted. She was like a fury. +“You brute, you beast, you toad,” she cried, and then threw herself over +Philip. + +He was unconscious. She lifted his head on to her lap, and, lost to all +shame, to all caution, to all thought but one thought, she kissed him on +the cheek, on the lips, on the eyes, on the forehead, crying, “Philip! +oh, Philip, Philip!” + +Ross was shuddering beside them. “Let me look at him,” he faltered, but +Kate fired back with a glance like an arrow, and said, screaming like a +sea-gull, “If you touch him again I'll strangle you.” + +Ross caught a glimpse of Philip's face, and he was terrified. Going to a +turf pit, he dipped both hands in the dub, and brought some water. “Take +this,” he said, “for Heaven's sake let me bathe his head.” + +He dashed the water on the pallid forehead, and then withdrew his eyes, +while the girl coaxed Philip back to consciousness with fresh kisses and +pleading words. + +“Is he breathing? Feel his heart. Any pulsation? Oh, God!” said Ross, +“it wasn't my fault.” He looked round with wild eyes; he meditated +flight. + +“Is he better yet?” + +“What's it to you, you coward?” said Kate, with a burning glance. She +went on with her work: “Come then, dear, come, come now.” + +Philip opened his eyes in a vacant stare, and rose on his elbow. Then +Kate fell back from him immediately, and began to cry quietly, being all +woman now, and her moral courage gone again in an instant. + +But the moral courage of Mr. Ross came back as quickly. He began to +sneer and to laugh lightly, picked up his riding-whip and strode over to +his horse. + +“Are you hurt?” asked Kate, in a low tone. + +“Is it Kate?” said Philip. + +At the sound of his voice, in that low whisper, Kate's tears came +streaming down. + +“I hope youll forgive me,” she said. “I should have taken your warning.” + +She wiped his face with the loose sleeve of her dress, and then he +struggled to his feet. + +“Lean on me, Philip.” + +“No, no, I can walk.” + +“Do take my arm.” + +“Oh no, Kate, I'm strong enough.” + +“Just to please me.” + +“Well--very well.” + +Ross looked on with jealous rage. His horse, frightened by the fight, +had twirled round and round till the reins were twisted into a knot +about the gorse stump, and as he liberated the beast he flogged it back +till it flew around him. Then he vaulted to the saddle, tugged at the +curb, and the horse reared. “Down,” he cried with an oath, and lashed +brutally at the horse's head. + +Meantime Kate, going past him with Philip on her arm, was saying softly, +“Are you feeling better, Philip?” + +And Ross, looking on in sulky meditation, sent a harsh laugh out of his +hot throat, and said, “Oh, you can make your mind easy about _him_, if +your other man fights for you like that you'll do. Thought you'd have +three of them, did you? Or perhaps you only wanted me for your decoy? +Why don't you kiss him now, when he can know it? But he's a beauty to +take care of you for somebody else. Fighting for the other one, eh? +Stuff and humbug! Take him home, and the curse of Judas on the brace of +you.” + +So saying, he burst into wild, derisive laughter, flogged his horse on +the ears and the nose, shouted “Down, you brute, down!” and shot off at +a gallop across the open Curragh. + +Philip and Kate stood where he had left them till he had disappeared in +the mist rising off the marshy land, and the hud of his horse's hoofs +could be no more heard. Their heads were down, and though their arms +were locked, their faces were turned half aside. There was silence +for some time. The girl's eyelids quivered; her look was anxious and +helpless. Then Philip said, “Let us go home,” and they began to walk +together. + +Not another word did they speak. Neither looked into the other's eyes. +Their entwined arms slackened a little in a passionless asundering, yet +both felt that they must hold tight or they would fall. It was almost +as if Ross's parting taunt had uncovered their hearts to each other, and +revealed to themselves their secret. They were like other children of +the garden of Eden, driven out and stripped naked. + +At the bridge they met Cæsar, Grannie, Nancy Joe, and half the +inhabitants of Sulby, abroad with lanterns in search of them. + +“They're here,” cried Cæsar. “You've chastised him, then! You'd bait +his head off, I'll go bail. And I believe enough you'll be forgiven, +sir. Yonder blow was almost bitterer than flesh can bear. Before my days +of grace--but, praise the Lord for His restraining hand, the very minute +my anger was up He crippled me in the hip with rheumatics. But what's +this?” holding the lantern over his head; “there's blood on your face, +sir?” + +“A scratch--it's nothing,” said Philip. + +“It's the women that's in every mischief,” said Cæsar. + +“Lord bless me, aren't the women as good as the men?” said Nancy. + +“H'm,” said Cæsar. “We're told that man was made a little lower than the +angels, but about women we're just left to our own conclusions.” + +“Scripture has nothing to do with Ross Christian, father,” said Grannie. + +“The Lord forbid it,” said Cæsar. “What can you get from a cat but his +skin? And doesn't the man come from Christian Ballawhaine!” + +“If it comes to that, though, haven't we all come from Adam?” said +Grannie. + +“Yes; and from Eve too, more's the pity,” said Cæsar. + + + + +VI. + +For some time thereafter Philip went no more to Sulby. He had a +sufficient excuse. His profession made demand of all his energies. When +he was not at work in Douglas he was expected to be at home with his +aunt at Ballure. But neither absence nor the lapse of years served +to lift him out of the reach of temptation. He had one besetting +provocation to remembrance--one duty which forbade him to forget +Kate--his pledge to Pete, his office as _Dooiney Molla_. Had he not +vowed to keep guard over the girl? He must do it. The trust was a sacred +one. + +Philip found a way out of his difficulty. The post was an impersonal and +incorruptible go-between, so he wrote frequently. Sometimes he had news +to send, for, to avoid the espionage of Cæsar, intelligence of Pete came +through him; occasionally he had love-letters to enclose; now and then +he had presents to pass on. When such necessity did not arise, he found +it agreeable to keep up the current of correspondence. At Christmas he +sent Christmas cards, on Midsummer Day a bunch of moss roses, and even +on St. Valentine's Day a valentine. All this was in discharge of his +duty, and everything he did was done in the name of Pete. He persuaded +himself that he sank his own self absolutely. Having denied his eyes the +very sight of the girl's face, he stood erect in the belief that he was +a true and loyal friend. + +Kate was less afraid and less ashamed. She took the presents from Pete +and wore them for Philip. In her secret heart she thought no shame of +this. The years gave her a larger flow of life, and made out of the +bewitching girl a splendid woman, brought up to the full estate of +maidenly beauty. + +This change wrought by time on her bodily form caused the past to seem +to her a very long way off. Something had occurred that made her a +different being. She was like the elder sister of that laughing girl +who had known Pete. To think of that little sister as having a kind of +control over her was impossible. Kate never did think of it. + +Nevertheless, she held her tongue. Her people were taken in by the +episode of Ross Christian. According to their view, Kate loved the man +and still longed for him, and that was why she never talked of Pete. +Philip was disgusted with her unfaithfulness to his friend, and that was +the reason of his absence. She never talked of Philip either, but they, +on their part, talked of him perpetually, and fed her secret passion +with his praises. Thus for three years these two were like two prisoners +in neighbouring cells, very close and yet very far apart, able to hear +each other's voices, yet never to see each other's faces, yearning to +come together and to touch, but unable to do so because of the wall that +stood between. + +Since the fight, Cæsar had removed her from all duties of the inn, and +one day in the spring she was in the gable house peeling rushes to make +tallow candles when Kelly, the postman, passed by the porch, where Nancy +Joe was cleaning the candle-irons. + +“Heard the newses, Nancy?” said Kelly. “Mr. Philip Christian is let off +two years' time and called to the bar.” + +Nancy looked grave. “I'm sure the young gentleman is that quiet and +studdy,” she said. “What are they doing on him?” + +“Only making him a full advocate, woman,” said Kelly. + +“You don't say?” said Nancy. + +“He passed his examination before the Govenar's man yesterday.” + +“Aw, there now!” + +“I took the letter to Ballure this evening.” + +“It's like you would, Mr. Kelly. That's the boy for you. I'm always +saying it. 'Deed I am, though, but there's ones here that won't have it +at all, at all.” + +“Miss Kate, you mane? We know the raison. He's lumps in her porridge, +woman. Good-day to you, Nancy.” + +“Yes, it's doing a nice day enough, Mr. Kelly,” said Nancy, and the +postman passed on. + +Kate came gliding out with a brush in her hand. “What was the postman +saying?” + +“That--Mr.--Philip--Christian--has been passing--for an advocate,” said +Nancy deliberately. + +Kate's eyes glistened, and her lips quivered with delight; but she only +said, with an air of indifference, “Was that all his news, then?” + +“All? D'ye say all?” said Nancy, digging away at the candle-irons. +“Listen to the girl! And him that good to her while her promist man's +away!” + +Kate shelled her rush, and said, with a sigh and a sly look, “I'm afraid +you think a deal too much of him, Nancy.” + +“Then I'll be making mends,” said Nancy, “for some that's thinking a +dale too little.” + +“I'm quite at a loss to know what you see in him,” said Kate. + +“Now, you don't say!” said Nancy with scorching irony. Then, banging +her irons, she added, “I'm not much of a woman for a man myself. They're +only poor helpless creatures anyway, and I don't approve of them. But +if I was for putting up with one of the sort, he wouldn't have legs and +arms like a dolly, and a face like curds and whey, and coat and trousers +that loud you can hear them coming up the street.” + +With this parting shot at Ross Christian, Nancy flung into the house, +thinking she had given Kate a dressing that she would never forget. +Kate was radiant. Such abuse was honey on her lips, such scoldings +were joy-bells in her ears. She took silent delight in provoking these +attacks. They served her turn both ways, bringing her delicious joy at +the praise of Philip, and at the same time preserving her secret. + + + + +VII. + +Latter that day Cæsar came in from the mill with the startling +intelligence that Philip was riding up on the highroad. + +“Goodness mercy!” cried Nancy, and she fled away to wash her face. +Grannie with a turn of the hand settled her cap, and smoothed her grey +hair under it. Kate herself had disappeared like a flash of light; but +as Philip dismounted at the gate, looking taller, and older, and paler, +and more serious, but raising his cap from his fair head and smiling a +smile like sunshine, she was coming leisurely out of the porch with a +bewitching hat over her wavy black hair and a hand-basket over her arm. + +Then there was a little start of surprise and recognition, a short catch +of quick breath and nervous salutations. + +“I'm going round to the nests,” she said. “I suppose you'll step in to +see mother.” + +“Time enough for that,” said Philip. “May I help you with the eggs +first? Besides, I've something to tell you.” + +“Is it that you're 'admitted?'” said Kate. + +“That's nothing,” said Philip. “Only the A B C, you know. Getting ready +to begin, so to speak.” + +They walked round to the stackyard, and he tied up his horse and gave it +hay. Then, while they poked about for eggs on hands and knees among the +straw, under the stacks and between the bushes, she said she hoped he +would have success, and he answered that success was more than a hope to +him now--it was a sort of superstition. She did not understand this, but +looked up at him from all fours with brightening eyes, and said, “What a +glorious thing it is to be a man!” + +“Is it?” said Philip. “And yet I remember somebody who said she wasn't +sorry to be a girl.” + +“Did I?” said Kate. “But that was long ago. And _I_ remember somebody +else who pretended he was glad I was.” + +“That was long ago too,” said Philip, and both laughed nervously. + +“What strange things girls are--and boys!” said Kate with a matronly +sigh, burying her face in a nest where a hen was clucking and two downy +chicks were peeping from her wing. + +They went through to the orchard, where the trees were breaking into +eager blossoms. + +“I've another letter for you from Pete,” said Philip. + +“So?” said Kate. + +“Here it is,” said Philip. + +“Won't you read it?” said Kate. + +“But it's yours; surely a girl doesn't want anybody else----” + +“Ah! but you're different, though; you know everything--and +besides--read it aloud, Philip.” + +With her basket of eggs on one arm, and the other hand on the +outstretched arm of an apple-tree, she waited while he read: + +“Dearest Kitty,--How's yourself, darling, and how's Philip, and +how's Grannie? I'm getting on tremendous. They're calling me Captain +now--Capt'n Pete. Sort of overseer at the Diamond Mines outside +Kimberley. Regular gentleman's life and no mistake. Nothing to do but +sit under a monstrous big umbrella, with a paper in your fist, like a +chairman, while twenty Kaffirs do the work. Just a bit of a tussle +now and then to keep you from dropping off. When a Kaffir turns up a +diamond, you grab it, and mark it on the time-sheet against his name. +They've got their own outlandish ones, but we always christen them +ourselves--Sixpence, Seven Waistcoats, Shoulder-of-Mutton, Twopenny +Trotter--anything you like. When a Kaffir strikes a diamond, he gets a +commission, and so does his overseer. I'm afraid I'm going to be getting +terrible rich soon. Tell the old man I'll be buying that har-monia yet. +They are a knowing lot, though, and if they can get up a dust to smuggle +a stone when you're not looking, they will. Then they sell it to the +blackleg Boers, and you've got to raise your voice like an advocate to +get it back somehow. But the Boers can't do no harm to you with their +fists at all--it's playing. They're a dirty lot, wonderful straight like +some of the lazy Manx ones, especially Black Tom. When they see us down +at the river washing, they say, 'What dirty people the English must be +if they have to wash themselves three times a day--we only do it once a +week.' When a Kaffir steals a stone we usually court-martial him, but I +don't hold with it, as the floggers on the compound can't be trusted; +so I always lick my own niggers, being more kinder, and if anybody does +anything against me, they lynch him.” + +Kate made a little patient sigh and turned away her head, while Philip, +in a halting voice, went on-- + +“Darling Kitty, I am longing mortal for a sight of your sweet face. When +the night comes, and I'll be lying in the huts--boards on the ground, +and good canvas, and everything comfortable--says I to the boys, 'Shut +your faces, men, and let a poor chap sleep;' but they never twig the +darkness of my meaning. I'll only be wanting a bit of quiet for thinking +of.... with the stars atwinkling down.... She's looking at that one.... +Shine on my angel....” + +“Really, Kate,” faltered Philip, “I can't----” + +“Give it to me, then,” said Kate. + +She was tugging with her trembling hand at the arm of the apple-tree, +and the white blossom was raining over her from the rowels of the thin +boughs overhead, like silver fish falling from the herring-net. Taking +the letter, she glanced over the close-- + +“darlin Kirry how is the mackral this saison and is the millin doing +middling and I wonder is the hens all layin and is the grace gone out +of the mares leg yet and how is the owl man and is he still playin hang +with the texes. Theer is a big chap heer that is strait like him he hath +swallowed the owl Book and cant help bring it up agen but dear Kirry no +more at present i axpect to be Home sune bogh, to see u all tho I dont +no azactly With luv your luving swateart peat.” + +When she had finished the letter, she turned it over in her fingers, and +gave another patient little sigh. “You didn't read it as it was spelled, +Philip,” she said. + +“What odds if the spelling is uncertain when the love is as sure as +that?” said Philip. + +“Did he write it himself, think you?” said Kate. + +“He signed it, anyway, and no doubt indited it too; but perhaps one of +the Gills boys held the pen.” + +She coloured a little, slipped the letter down her dress into her +pocket, and looked ashamed. + + + + +VIII. + +This shame at Pete's letter tormented Philip, and he stayed away again. +His absence stimulated Kate and made Philip himself ashamed. She was +vexed with him that he did not see that all this matter of Pete was +foolishness. It was absurd to think of a girl marrying a man whom she +had known when he was a boy. But Philip was trying to keep the bond +sacred, and so she made her terms with it. She used Pete as a link to +hold Philip. + +After the lapse of some months, in which Philip had not been seen at +Sulby, she wrote him a letter. It was to say how anxious she had been at +the length of time since she had last heard from Pete, and to ask if he +had any news to relieve her fears. The poor little lie was written in +a trembling hand which shook honestly enough, but from the torment of +other feelings. + +Philip answered the letter in person. Something had been speaking to him +day and night, like the humming of a top, finding him pretexts on which +to go; but now he had to make excuses for staying so long away. It was +evening. Kate was milking, and he went out to her in the cowhouse. + +“We began to think we were to see no more of you,” she said, over the +rattle of the milk in the pail. + +“I've--I've been ill,” said Philip. + +The rattle died to a thin hiss. “Very ill?” she asked. + +“Well, no--not seriously,” he answered. + +“I never once thought of that,” she said. “Something ought to have told +me. I've been reproaching you, too.” + +Philip felt shame of his subterfuge, but yet more ashamed of the truth; +so he leaned against the door and watched in silence. The smell of hay +floated down from the loft, and the odour of the cow's breath came in +gusts as she turned her face about. Kate sat on the milking-stool close +by the ewer, and her head, on which she wore a sun-bonnet, she leaned +against the cow's side. + +“No news of Pete, then? No?” she said. + +“No,” said Philip. + +Kate dug her head deeper in the cow, and muttered, “Dear Pete! So +simple, so natural.” + +“He is,” said Philip. + +“So good-hearted, too.” + +“Yes.” + +“And such a manly fellow--any girl might like him,” said Kate. + +“Indeed, yes,” said Philip. + +There was silence again, and two pigs which had been snoring on the +manure heap outside began to snort their way home. Kate turned her head +so that the crown of the sun-bonnet was toward Phillip, and said-- + +“Oh, dear! Can there be anything so terrible as marrying somebody you +don't care for?” + +“Nothing so bad,” said Philip. + +The mouth of the sun-bonnet came round. “Yes, there's one thing worse, +Philip.” + +“No?” + +“Not having married somebody you do,” said Kate, and the milk rattled +like hail. + +In the straw behind. Kate there was a tailless Manx cat with three +tailed kittens, and Philip began to play with them. Being back to back +with Kate, he could keep his countenance. + +“This old Horney is terrible for switching,” said Kate, over her +shoulder. “Don't you think you could hold her tail?” + +That brought them face to face again. “It's so sweet to have some one to +talk to about Pete,” said Kate. + +“Yes?” + +“I don't know how I could bear his long absence but for that.” + +“Are you longing so much, Kate?” + +“Oh, no, not longing--not to say longing. Only you can't think what it +is to be... have you never been yourself, Philip?” + +“What?” “Hold it tight... in love? No?” + +“Well,” said Philip, speaking at the crown of the sun-bonnet. “Ha! ha! +well, not properly perhaps--I don't--I can hardly say, Kate.” + +“There! You've let it go, after all, and she's covered me with the milk! +But I'm finished, anyway.” + +Kate was suddenly radiant. She kissed Horney, and hugged her calf in the +adjoining stall; and as they crossed the haggard, Philip carrying the +pail, she scattered great handfuls of oats to a cock and his two hens as +they cackled their way to roost. + +“You'll be sure to come again soon, Philip, eh? It's so sweet to have +some one to remind me of----” but Pete's name choked her now. “Not that +I'm likely to forget him--now is that likely? But it's such a weary time +to be left alone, and a girl gets longing. Did I now? Give me the milk, +then. Did I say I wasn't? Well, you can't expect a girl to be _always_ +reasonable.” + +“Good-bye, Kate.” + +“Yes, you had better go now--good-bye.” + +Philip went away in pain, yet in delight, with a delicious thrill, and +a sense of stifling hypocrisy. He had felt like a fool. Kate must have +thought him one. But better she should think him a fool than a traitor. +It was all his fault. Only for him the girl would have been walled round +by her love for Pete. He would come no more. + + + + +IX. + +Philip held to his resolution for three months, and grew thin and +pale. Then another letter came from Pete--a letter for himself, and he +wondered what to do with it. To send it by post, pretending to be ill +again, would be hypocrisy he could not support. He took it. + +The family were all at home. Nancy had just finished a noisy churning, +and Kate was in the dairy, weighing the butter into pounds and stamping +it. Philip read the letter in a loud voice to the old people in the +kitchen, and the soft thumping and watery swishing ceased in the damp +place adjoining. Pete was in high feather. He had made a mortal lot +of money lately, and was for coming home quickly. Couldn't say exactly +when, for some rascally blackleg Boers, who had been corrupting his +Kaffirs and slipped up country with a pile of stones, had first to be +followed and caught. The job wouldn't take long though, and they might +expect to see him back within a twelvemonth, with enough in his pocket +to drive away the devil and the coroner anyway. + +“Bould fellow!” said Cæsar. + +“Aw, deed on Pete!” said Grannie. + +“Now, if it wasn't for that Ross----” said Nancy. + +Philip went into the dairy, where Kate was now skimming the cream of the +last night's milking. He was sorry there was nothing but a message for +her this time. Had she answered Pete's former letters? No, she had not. + +“I must be writing soon, I suppose,” she said, blowing the yellow +surface. “But I wish--_puff_--I could have something to tell him--_puff, +puff_--about you.” + +“About me, Kate?” + +“Something sweet, I mean “--_puff, puff, puff_. + +She shot a sly look upward. “Aren't you sure yet? Can't say still? Not +properly? No?” + +Philip pretended not to understand. Kate's laugh echoed in the empty +cream tins. “How you want people to say things!” + +“No, really--” began Philip. + +“I've always heard that the girls of Douglas are so beautiful. You must +see so many now. Oh, it would be delicious to write a long story to +Pete. Where you met--in church, naturally. What she's like--fair, of +course. And--and all about it, you know.” + +“That's a story you will never tell to Pete, Kate,” said Philip. + +“No, never,” said Kate quite as light, and this being just what she +wished to hear, she added mournfully. “Don't say that, though. You can't +think what pleasure you are denying me, and yourself, too. Take some +poor girl to your heart, Philip. You don't know how happy it will make +you.” + +“Are _you_ so happy, then, Kate?” + +Kate laughed merrily. “Why, what do _you_ think?” + +“Dear old Pete--how happy _he_ should be,” said Philip. + +Kate began to hate the very name of Pete. She grew angry with Philip +also. Why couldn't he guess? Concealment was eating her heart out. +The next time she saw Philip, he passed her in the market-place on the +market-day, as she stood by the tipped-up gig, selling her butter. There +was a chatter of girls all round as he bowed and went on. This vexed +her, and she sold out at a penny a pound less, got the horse from the +“Saddle,” and drove home early. + +On the way to Sulby she overtook Philip and drew up. He was walking to +Kirk Michael to visit the old Deemster, who was ill. Would he not take +a lift? He hesitated, half declined, and then got into the gig. As she +settled herself comfortably after this change, he trod on the edge of +her dress. At that he drew quickly away as if he had trodden on her +foot. + +She laughed, but she was vexed; and when he got down at “The Manx +Fairy,” saying he might call on his way back in the evening, she had no +doubt Grannie would be glad to see him. + +The girls of the market-place were standing by the mill-pond, work done, +and arms crossed under their aprons, twittering like the pairing birds +about them in the trees, when Philip returned home by Sulby. He saw Kate +coming down the glen road, driving two heifers with a cushag for switch +and flashing its gold at them in the horizontal gleams of sunset. She +had recovered her good-humour, and was swinging along, singing merry +snatches as she came--all life, all girlish blood and beauty. + +She pretended not to see him until they were abreast, and the heifers +were going into the yard. Then she said, “I've written and told him.” + +“What?” said Philip. + +“That you say you are a confirmed old bachelor.” + +“That _I_ say so?” + +“Yes; and that _I_ say you are so distant with a girl that I don't +believe you have a heart at all.” + +“You don't?” + +“No; and that he couldn't have left anybody better to look after me +all these years, because you haven't eyes or ears or a thought for any +living creature except himself.” + +“You've never written that to Pete?” said Philip. + +“Haven't I, though?” said Kate, and she tripped off on tiptoe. + +He tripped after her. She ran into the yard. He ran also. She opened +the gate of the orchard, slipped through, and made for the door of the +dairy, and there he caught her by the waist. + +“Never, you rogue! Say no, say no!” he panted. + +“No,” she whispered, turning up her lips for a kiss. + + + + +X. + +Grannie saw nothing of Philip that night. He went home tingling with +pleasure, and yet overwhelmed with shame. Sometimes he told himself that +he was no better than a Judas, and sometimes that Pete might never +come back. The second thought rose oftenest. It crossed his mind like a +ghostly gleam. He half wished to believe it. When he counted up the odds +against Pete's return, his pulse beat quick. Then he hated himself. He +was in torment. But under his distracted heart there was a little chick +of frightened joy, like a young cuckoo hatched in a wagtail's nest. + +After many days, in which no further news had come from Pete, Kate +received this brief letter from Philip: + +“I am coming to see you this evening. Have something of grave importance +to tell you.” + +It was afternoon, and Kate ran upstairs, hurried on her best frock, and +came down to help Nancy to gather apples in the orchard. Black Tom +was there, new thatching the back of the house, and Cæsar was making +sugganes (straw rope) for him with a twister. There was a soft feel of +autumn in the air, pigeons were cooing in the ledges of the mill-house +gable, and everything was luminous and tranquil. Kate had climbed to +the fork of a tree, and was throwing apples into Nancy's apron, when the +orchard gate clicked, and she uttered a little cry of joy unawares as +Philip entered. To cover this, she pretended to be falling, and he ran +to help her. + +“Oh, it's nothing,” she said. “I thought the bough was breaking. So it's +you!” Then, in a clear voice, “Is your apron full, Nancy? Yes? Bring +another basket, then; the white one with the handles. Did you come Laxey +way by the coach? Bode over, eh? Nancy, do you really think we'll have +sugar enough for all these Keswicks?” + +“Good evenin', Mr. Christian, sir,” said Cæsar. And Black Tom, from the +ladder on the roof, nodded his wide straw brim. + +“Thatching afresh, Mr. Cregeen?” + +“Covering it up, sir; covering it up. May the Lord cover our sins up +likewise, or how shall we cover ourselves from His avenging wrath?” + +“How vexing!” said Kate, from the tree. “Half of them get bruised, +and will be good for nothing but preserving. They drop at the first +touch--so ripe, you see.” + +“May we all be ripe for the great gathering, and good for preserving, +too,” said Cæsar. “Look at that big one, now--knotted like a +blacksmith's muscles, but it'll go rotten as fast as the least lil one +of the lot. It's taiching us a lesson, sir, that we all do fall--big +mountains as aisy as lil cocks. This world is changeable.” + +Philip was not listening, but looking up at Kate, with a face of +half-frightened tenderness. + +“Do you know,” she said, “I was afraid you must be ill again--your +apron, Nancy--that was foolish, wasn't it?” + +“No; _I_ have been well enough,” said Philip. + +Kate looked at him. “Is it somebody else?” she said. “I got your +letter.” + +“Can I help?” said Philip. “What is it? I'm sure there's something,” + said Kate. + +“Set your foot here,” he said. + +“Let me down, I feel giddy.” + +“Slowly, then. Hold by this one. Give me your hand.” + +Their fingers touched, and communicated fire. + +“Why don't you tell me?” she said, with a passionate tightening of his +hand. “It's bad news, isn't it? Are you going away?” + +“Somebody who went away will never come back,” he answered. + +“Is it--Pete?” + +“Poor Pete is gone,” said Philip. + +Her throat fluttered. “Gone?” + +“He is dead,” said Philip. + +She tottered, but drew herself up quickly. “Stop!” she said. “Let me +make sure. Is there no mistake? Is it true?” + +“Too true.” + +“I can bear the truth now--but afterwards--to-night--tomorrow--in the +morning it might kill me if----” + +“Pete is dead, Kate; he died at Kimberley.” + +“Philip!” + +She burst into a wild fit of hysterical weeping, and buried her face his +his breast. + +He put his arms about her, thinking to soothe her. “There! be brave! +Hold yourself firm. It's a terrible blow. I was too sudden. My poor +girl. My brave girl!” + +She clung to him like a terrified child; the tears came from under her +eyelids tightly closed; the flood-gates of four years' reserve went down +in a moment, and she kissed him on the lips. + +And, throbbing with bliss and a blessed relief from four years hypocrisy +and treason, he kissed her back, and they smiled through their tears. + +Poor Pete! Poor Pete! Poor Pete! + + + + +XI. + +At the sound of Kate's crying, Cæsar had thrown away the twister and +come close to listen, and Black Tom had dropped from the thatch. Nancy +ran back with the basket, and Grannie came hurrying from the house. + +Cæsar lifted both hands solemnly. “Now, you that are women, control +yourselves,” said he, “and listen while I spake. Peter Quilliam's dead +in Kimberley.” + +“Goodness mercy!” cried Grannie. + +“Lord alive!” cried Nancy. + +And the two women went indoors, threw their aprons over their heads, and +rocked themselves in their seats. + +“Aw boy veen! boy veen!” + +Kate came tottering in, ghostly white, and the women fell to comforting +her, thereby making more tumult with their soothing moans than Kate with +her crying. + +“Chut'! Put a good face on it, woman,” said Black Tom. “A whippa of a +girl like you will be getting another soon, and singing, 'Hail, Smiling +Morn!' with the best.” + +“Shame on you, man. Are you as drunk as Mackillya?” cried Nancy. “Your +own grandson, too!” + +“Never another for Kate, anyway,” wept Grannie. “Aw boy veen, aw boy +veen!” + +“Maybe he had another himself, who knows?” said Black Tom. “Out of sight +out of mind, and these sailor lads have a rag on lots of bushes.” + +Kate was helped to her room upstairs, Philip sat down in the kitchen, +the news spread like a curragh fire, and the barroom was full in five +minutes. In the midst of all stood Cæsar, solemn and expansive. + +“He turned his herring yonder night when he left goodbye to the four of +us,” he said. “My father did the same the night he was lost running rum +for Whitehaven, and I've never seen a man do it and live.” + +“It's forgot at you father,” wept Grannie. “It was Mr. Philip that +turned it. Aw boy veen! boy veen!” + +“How could that be, mother?” said Cæsar. “Mr. Philip isn't dead.” + +But Grannie heard no more. She was busy with the consolations of +half-a-dozen women who were gathered around her. “I dreamt it the +night he sailed. I heard a cry, most terrible, I did. 'Father,' says I, +'what's that?' It was the same as if I had seen the poor boy coming to +his end un-timeously. And I didn't get a wink on the night.” + +“Well, he has gone to the rest that remaineth,” said Cæsar. “The grass +perisheth, and the worm devoureth, and well all be in heaven with him +soon.” + +“God forbid, father; don't talk of such dreadful things,” said Grannie, +napping her apron. “Do you say his mother, ma'am? Is she in life? No, +but under the sod, I don't know the years. Information of the lungs, +poor thing.” + +“I've known him since I was a slip of a boy,” said one. “It was whip-top +time--no, it was peg-top time----” + +“I saw him the morning he sailed,” said another. “I was standing +_so_----” + +“Mr. Christian saw him last,” moaned Grannie, and the people in the +bar-room peered through at Philip with awe. + +“I felt like a father for the lad myself,” said Cæsar, “he was always +my white-headed boy, and I stuck to him with life. He desarved it, too. +Maybe his birth was a bit mischancy, but what's the ould saying, 'Don't +tell me what I was, tell me what I am.' And Pete was that civil with the +tongue--a civiller young man never was.” + +Black Tom _tsht_ and spat. “Why, you were shouting out of mercy at the +lad, and knocking him about like putty. He wouldn't get lave to live +with you, and that's why he went away.” + +“You're bad to forget, Thomas--I've always noticed it,” said Cæsar. + +“You'll be putting the bell about, and praiching his funeral, eh, +Cæsar?” said somebody. + +“'Deed, yes, man, Sabbath first,” said Cæsar. + +“That's impossible, father,” said Grannie. “How's the girl to have her +black ready?” + +“Sunday week, then, or Sunday fortnight, or the Sunday after the Melliah +(harvest-home),” said Cæsar; “the crops are waiting for saving, but a +dead man is past it. Oh, I'll be faithful, I'll give it them straight, +it's a time for spaking like a dying man to dying men; I'll take a tex' +that'll be a lesson and a warning, 'Ho, every one that thirsteth----” + +Black Tom _tsht_ and spat again. “I wouldn't, Cæsar; they'll think +you're going to trate them,” he muttered. + +Philip was asked for particulars, and he brought out a letter. Jonaique +Jelly, John the Clerk, and Johnny the Constable had come in by this +time. “Read it, Jonaique,” said Cæsar. + +“A clane pipe first,” said Black Tom. “Aren't you smook-ing on it, +Cæsar? And isn't there a croppa of rum anywhere? No! Not so much as +a plate of crackers and a drop of tay going? Is it to be a totaller's +funeral then?” + +“This is no time for feasting to the refreshment of our carnal bodies,” + said Cæsar severely. “It's a time for praise and prayer.” + +“I'll pud up a word or dwo,” said the Constable meekly. + +“Masther Niplightly,” said Cæsar, “don't be too ready to show your gift. +It's vanity. I'll engage in prayer myself.” And Cæsar offered praise for +all departed in faith and fear. + +“Cæsar is nod a man of a liberal spirit, bud he is powerful in prayer, +dough,” whispered the Constable. + +“He isn't a prodigal son, if that's what you mane,” said Black Tom. +“Never seen him shouting after anybody with a pint, anyway.” + +“Now for the letter, Jonaique,” said Cæsar. + +It was from one of the Gills' boys who had sailed with Pete, and +hitherto served as his letter-writer. + +“'Respected Sir,'” read Jonaique, “'with pain and sorrow I write these +few lines, to tell you of poor Peter Quilliam----'” + +“Aw boy veen, boy veen!” broke in Grannie. + +“'Knowing you were his friend in the old island, and the one he talked +of mostly, except the girl----'” + +“Boy ve----” + +“Hush, woman.” + +“'He made good money out here, at the diamond mines----'” + +“Never a yellow sovereign he sent to me, then,” said Black Tom, “nor +the full of your fist of ha'pence either. What's the use of getting +grand-childers?” + +Cæsar waved his hand. “Go on, Jonaique. It's bad when the deceitfulness +of riches is getting the better of a man.” + +“Where was I? Oh, 'good money ------' 'Yet he was never for taking joy +in it----'” + +“More money, more cares,” muttered Cæsar. + +“'But talking and talking, and scheming for ever, for coming home.'” + +“Ah! home is a full cup,” moaned Grannie. “It was a show the way that +lad was fond of it. 'Give me a plate of mate, bolstered with cabbage, +and what do I care for their buns and sarves, Grannie,' says he. Aw, boy +veen, boy bogh!” + +“What does the nightingale care for a golden cage when he can get a +twig?” said Cæsar. + +“Is the boy's chest home yet?” asked John the Clerk. + +“There's something about it here,” said Jonaique, “if people would only +let a man get on.” + +“It's mine,” said Black Tom. + +“We'll think of that by-and-bye,” said Cæsar, waving his hand to +Jonaique. + +“'He had packed his chest for going, when four blacklegs, who had been +hanging round the compound, tempting and plaguing the Kaffirs, made off +with a bag of stones. Desperate gang, too; so nobody was running to be +sent after them. But poor Peter, being always a bit bull-necked, was +up to the office in a jiffy, and Might he go? And off in chase in the +everin' with the twenty Kaffirs of his own company to help him--not much +of a lot neither, and suspected of dealing diamonds with the blacklegs +times; but Peter always swore their love for him was getting thicker and +stronger every day like sour cream. “The captain's love has been their +theme, and shall be till they die,” said Peter.'” + +“He drank up the Word like a thirsty land the rain,” said Cæsar. “Peter +Quilliam and I had mortal joy of each other. 'Good-bye, father,' says +he, and he was shaking me by the hand ter'ble. But go on, Jonaique.” + +“'That was four months ago, and a fortnight since eight of his Kaffirs +came back.'” + +“Aw dear!” “Well, well!” “Lord-a-massy!” “Hush!” + +“'They overtook the blacklegs far up country, and Peter tackled them. +But they had Winchester repeaters, and Peter's boys didn't know the +muzzle of a gun from the neck of a gin-bottle. So the big man of the +gang cocked his piece at Peter, and shouted at him like a high bailiff, +“You'd better go back the way you came.” “Not immajetly,” said Peter, +and stretched him. Then there was smoke like a smithy on hooping-day, +and “To your heels, boys,” shouted Peter. And if the boys couldn't equal +Peter with their hands, they could bate him with their toes, and the +last they heard of him he was racing behind them with the shots of the +blacklegs behind him, and shouting mortal, “Oh, oh! All up! I'm done! +Home and tell, boys! Oh, oh.”'” + +“Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy. When I fall I shall arise. +Selah,” said Cæsar. + +Amid the tumult of moans which followed the reading, Philip, sitting +with head on his hand by the ingle, grew hot and cold with the thought +that after all there was no actual certainty that Pete was dead. Nobody +had seen him die, nobody had buried him; the story of the returned +Kaffirs might be a lie to cover their desertion of Pete, their betrayal +of him, or their secret league with the thieving Boers. At one awful +moment Philip asked himself how he had ever believed the letter. Perhaps +he had _wanted_ to believe it. + +Nancy Joe touched him on the shoulder. “Kate is waiting for a word +with you alone, sir,” she said, and Philip crossed the kitchen into +the little parlour beyond, chill with china and bowls of sea-eggs and +stuffed sea-birds. + +“He's feeling it bad,” said Nancy. + +“Never been the same since Pete went to the Cape,” said Cæsar. + +“I don't know for sure what good lads are going to it for,” moaned +Grannie. “And calling it Good Hope of all names! Died of a bullet in his +head, too, aw dear, aw dear! Discussion of the brain it's like. And look +at them black-heads too, as naked as my hand, I'll go bail. I hate the +nasty dirts! Cæsar may talk of one flesh and brethren and all to that, +but for my part I'm not used of black brothers, and as for black angels +in heaven, it's ridiculous.” + +“When you're all done talking I'll finish the letter,” said Jonaique. + +“They can't help it, Mr. Jelly, the women can't help it,” said Cæsar. + +“'Respected Sir, I must now close, but we are strapping up the chest of +the deceased, just as he left it, and sending it to catch the steamer, +the _Johannesburg_, leaving Cape Town Wednesday fortnight----'” + +“Hm! Johannesburg. I'll meet her at the quay--it's my duty to meet her,” + said Cæsar. + +“And I'll board her in the bay,” shouted Black Tom. + +“Thomas Quilliam,” said Cæsar, “it's borne in on my spirit that the +devil of greed is let loose on you.” + +“Cæsar Cregeen, don't make a nose of wax of me,” bawled Tom, “and don't +think because you're praiching a bit that religion is going to die with +you. Your head's swelling tre-menjous, and-you won't be able to sleep +soon without somebody to tickle your feet. You'll be forgiving sins +next, and taking money for absolution, and these ones will be making +a pope of you and paying you pence. Pope Cæsar, the publican, in his +chapel hat and white choker! But that chiss is mine, and if there's law +in the land I'll have it.” + +With that Black Tom swept out of the house, and Cæsar wiped his eyes. + +“No use smoothing a thistle, Mr. Cregeen,” said Jonaique soothingly. + +“I've a conscience void of offence.” said Cæsar. “I can only follow the +spirit's leading. But when Belial----” + +He was interrupted by a most mournful cry of “Look here! Aw, look, then, +look!” + +Nancy was coming out of the back-kitchen with something between the +tips of her fingers. It was a pair of old shoes, covered with dirt and +cobwebs. + +“These were his wearing boots,” she said, and she put them on the +counter. + +“Dear heart, yes, the very ones,” said Grannie. “Poor boy, they'd move a +heart of stone to see them. Something to remember him by, anyway. Many +a mile his feet walked in them; but they're resting now in Abraham's +bosom.” + +Then Cæsar's voice rose loud over the doleful tones around the counter. +“'Vital Spark of Heavenly Flame'--raise it, Mr. Niplightly. Pity we +haven't Peter and his fiddle here--he played with life.” + +“I can'd sing to-day, having a cold, bud I'll whisle id,” said the +Constable. + +“Pitch it in altoes, then,” said Cæsar. “I'm a bit of a base myself, but +not near so base as Peter.” + +Meanwhile a little drama of serious interest was going on upstairs. +There sat Kate before the looking-glass, with flushed cheeks and +quivering mouth. The low drone of many voices came to her through the +floor. Then a dull silence and one voice, and Nancy Joe coming and going +between the kitchen and bedroom. + +“What are they doing now, Nancy?” said Kate. + +“First one's praying, and then another's praying,” said Nancy. +“Lord-a-massy, thinks I, it'll be my turn next, and what'll I say?” + +“Where's Mr. Christian?” + +“Gone into the parlour. I whispered him you wanted him alone.” + +“You never said that, Nancy,” said Kate, at Nancy's reflection in the +glass. + +“Well, it popped out,” said Nancy. + +Kate went down, with a look of softened sorrow, and Philip, without +lifting his eyes, began bemoaning Pete. They would never know his +like--so simple, so true, so brave; never, never. + +He was fighting against his shame at first seeing the girl after that +kiss, which seemed to him now like treason at the mouth of a grave. + +But, with the magic of a woman's art, Kate consoled him. He had +one great comfort--he had been a loyal friend; such fidelity, such +constancy, such affection, forgetting the difference of place, of +education--everything. + +Philip looked up at last, and there was the lovely face with its beaming +eyes. He turned to go, and she said, softly, “How we shall miss you!” + +“Why so?” said Philip. + +“We can't expect to see you so often now--now that you've not the same +reason for coming.” + +“I'll be here on Sunday,” said Philip. + +“Then you don't intend to desert us yet--not just yet, Philip?” + +“Never!” said Philip. + +“Well, good-night! Not that way--not by the porch. Good-night!” + +As Philip went down the road in the darkness, he heard the words of the +hymn that was being sung inside: + +“Thy glory why didst Thou enshrine In such a clod of earth as mine, And +wrap Thee in my clay.” + + + + +XII. + +At that moment day was breaking over the plains of the Transvaal. The +bare Veldt was opening out as the darkness receded, depth on depth, +like the surface of an unbroken sea. Not a bush, not a path, only a few +log-houses at long distances and wooden beacons like gibbets to define +the Boer farms. No sound in the transparent air, no cloud in the +unveiling sky; just the night creeping off in silence as if in fear of +awakening the sleeping morning. + +Across the soulless immensity a covered waggon toiled along with four +horses rattling their link chains, and a lad sideways on the shaft +dangling his legs, twiddling the rope reins and whistling. Inside the +waggon, under a little window with its bit of muslin curtain, a man lay +in the agony of a bullet-wound in his side, and an old Boer and a +woman stood beside him. He was lying hard on the place of his pain and +rambling in delirium. + +“See, boys? Don't you see them?” + +“See what, my lad?” said the Boer simply, and he looked through the +waggon window. + +“There's the head-gear of the mines. Look! the iron roofs are +glittering. And yonder's the mine tailings. We'll be back in a jiffy. A +taste of the whip, boys, and away!” + +Untouched by visions, the old Boer could see nothing. + +“What does he see, wife, think you?” + +“What can he see, stupid, with his face in the pillow like that?” + +With the rushing of blood in his ears the sick man called out again: + +“Listen! Don't you hear it? That's the noise of the batteries. Whip up, +and away! Away!” and he tore at the fringe of the blanket covering him +with his unconscious fingers. + +“Poor boy! he's eager to get to the coast But will he live to cover +another morgen, think you?” + +“God knows, Jan--God only knows.” + +And the Veldt was very wide, and the sea and its ships were far away, +and over the weary stretch of grass, and rock, and sand, there was +nothing on the horizon between desolate land and dominating sky but a +waste looking like a chaos of purple and green, where no bird ever sang +and no man ever lived, and God Himself was not. + + + + +XIII. + +“She loves me! She loves me! She loves me!” The words sang in Philip's +ears like a sweet tune half the way back to Ballure. Then he began to +pluck at the brambles by the wayside, to wound his hand by snatching +at the gorse, and to despise himself for being glad when he should have +been in grief. Still, he was sure of it; there was no making any less of +it. She loved him, he was free to love her, there need be no hypocrisy +and no self-denial; so he wiped the blood from his fingers, and crept +into the blue room of Auntie Nan. + +The old lady, in a dainty cap with flying streamers, was sitting by +the fireside spinning. She had heard the news of Pete as Philip passed +through to Sulby, and was now wondering if it was not her duty to +acquaint Uncle Peter. The sweet and natty old gentlewoman, brought up in +the odour of gentility, was thinking on the lines of poor Bridget, Black +Tom when dying under the bare scraas, that a man's son was his son in +spite of law or devil. + +She decided against telling the Ballawhaine by remembering an incident +in the life of his father. It was about Philip's father, too; so Philip +stretched his legs from the sofa towards the hearth, and listened to the +old Auntie's voice over the whirr of her wheel, with another voice--a +younger voice, an unheard voice--breaking: in at the back of his ears +when the wheel stopped, and a sweet undersong inside of him always, +saying, “Be sensible; there is no disloyalty; Pete is dead. Poor Pete! +Poor old Pete!” + +“Though he had cast your father off, Philip, for threatening to make +your mother his wife, he never believed there was a parson on the island +would dare to marry them against his wish.” + +“No, really?” + +“No; and when Uncle Peter came in at dinner-time a week after and said, +'It's all over,' he said, 'No, sir, no,' and threw down his spoon in +the plate, and the hot broth splashed on my hand, I remember. But Peter +said, 'It's past praying for, sir,' and then grandfather cried, 'No, I +tell you no.' 'But I tell you yes, sir,' said Peter. 'Maughold Church +yesterday morning before service.' Then grandfather lost himself, and +called Peter 'Liar,' and cried that your father couldn't do it. 'And, +besides, he's my own son after all, and would not,' said grandfather. +But I could see that he believed what Uncle Peter had told him, and, +when Peter began to cry, he said, 'Forgive me, my boy; I'm your father +for all, and I've a right to your forgiveness.' All the same, he +wouldn't be satisfied until he had seen the register, and I had to go +with him to the church.” + +“Poor old grandfather!” + +“The vicar in those days was a little dotty man named Kissack, and it +was the joy of his life to be always crushing and stifling somebody, +because somebody was always depriving him of his rights or something.” + +“I remember him--the Cockatoo. His favourite text was, 'Jesus said, then +follow Me,' only the people declared he always wanted to go first.” + +“Shocking, Philip. It was evening when we drove up to Maughold, and the +little parson was by the Cross, ordering somebody with a cane. 'I am +told you married my son yesterday; is it true?' said grandfather. 'Quite +true,' said the vicar. 'By banns or special license?' grandfather asked. +'License, of course,' the vicar answered.” + +“Curt enough, any way.” + +“'Show me the register,' said grandfather, and his face twitched and his +voice was thick. 'Can't you believe me?' said the vicar. 'The register,' +said grandfather. Then the vicar turned the key in the church door and +strutted up the aisle, humming something. I tried to keep grandfather +back even then. 'What's the use?' I said, for I knew he was only +fighting against belief. But, hat in hand, he followed to the Communion +rail, and there the vicar laid the open book before him. Oh, Philip, +shall I ever forget it? How it all comes back--the little dim church, +the smell of damp and of velvet under the holland covers of the pulpit, +and the empty place echoing. And grandfather fixed his glasses and +leaned over the register, but he could see nothing--only blurr, blurr, +blurr. + +“'_You_ look at it, child,' he said, over his shoulder. But I daren't +face it; so he rubbed his glasses and leaned over the book again. Oh +dear! he was like one who looks down the list of the slain for the name +he prays he may not find. But the name was there, too surely: 'Thomas +Wilson Christian... to Mona Crellin... signed Wm. Crellin and something +Kissack.'” + +Philip's breath came hot and fast. + +“The little vicar was swinging his cane to and fro on the other side of +the rail and smiling, and grandfather raised his eyes to him and said, +'Do you know what you've done, sir? You've robbed me of my first-born +son and ruined him.' 'Nonsense, sir,' said the vicar. 'Your son was of +age, and his wife had the sanction of her father. Was I to go round by +Ballawhaine for permission to do my duty as a clergyman?' 'Duty!' cried +grandfather. 'When a young man marries, he marries for heaven or for +hell. Your duty as a clergyman!' he cried, till his voice rang in the +roof. 'If a son of yours had his hand at his throat, would you call +it my duty as Deemster to hand him a knife.' 'Silence, sir,' said the +vicar. Remember where you stand, or, Deemster though you are, you shall +repent it.' 'Arrest me for brawling, will you?' cried grandfather, and +he snatched the cane out of the vicar's hand and struck him across the +breast. 'Arrest me now,' he said, and then tottered and stumbled out of +the church by my arm and the doors of the empty pews.” + +Philip went to bed that night with burning brow and throbbing throat. +He had made a startling discovery. He was standing where his father +had stood before him; he was doing what his father had done; he was +in danger of his father's fate! Where was his head that he had never +thought of this before? + +It was hard--it was terrible. Now that he was free to love the girl, he +realised what it meant to love her. Nevertheless he was young, and he +rebelled, he fought, he would not deliberate, The girl conquered in his +heart that night, and he lay down to sleep. + +But next morning he told himself, with a shudder, that it was lucky he +had gone no farther. One step more and all the evil of his father's +life might have been repeated in his own. There had been nothing said, +nothing done. He would go to Sulby no more. + + + + +XIV. + +That mood lasted until mid-day, and then a scout of the line of love +began to creep into his heart in disguise. He reminded himself that he +had promised to go on Sunday, and that it would be unseemly to break off +the acquaintance too suddenly, lest the simple folks should think he had +borne with them throughout four years merely for the sake of Pete. But +after Sunday he would take a new turn. + +He found Kate dressed as she had never been before. Instead of the loose +red bodice and the sun-bonnet, the apron and the kilted petticoat, she +wore a close-fitting dark green frock with a lace collar. The change was +simple, but it made all the difference. She was not more beautiful, but +she was more like a lady. + +It was Sunday evening, and the “Fairy” was closed. Csesar and Grannie +were at the preaching-house, Nancy Joe was cooking crowdie for supper, +and Kate and Philip talked. The girl was quieter than Philip had ever +known her--more modest, more apt to blush, and with the old audacity of +word and look quite gone. They talked of success in life, and she said-- + +“How I should like to fight my way in the world as you are doing! But a +woman can do nothing to raise herself. Isn't it hard? Whatever the place +where she was born in, she must remain there all her days. She can see +her brothers rise, and her friends perhaps, but she must remain below. +Isn't it a pity? It isn't that she wants to be rich or great. No, not +that; only she doesn't want to be left behind by the people she likes. +She must be, though, and just because she's a woman. I'm sure it's so in +the Isle of Man, anyway. Isn't it cruel?” + +“But aren't you forgetting something?” said Philip. + +“Yes?” + +“If a woman can't rise of herself because the doors of life are locked +to her, it is always possible for a man to raise her.” + +“Some one who loves her, you mean, and so lifts her to his own level, +and takes her up with him as he goes up?” + +“Why not?” said Philip. + +Kate's eyes beamed like sunshine. “That is lovely,” she said in a low +voice. “Do you know, I never thought of that before! If it were my case, +I should like that best of all. Side by side with him, and he doing all? +Oh, that is beautiful!” + +And she gazed up with a timid joy at the inventive being who had thought +of this as at something supernatural. + +Cæsar and Grannie came back, both in fearful outbursts of Sunday +clothes. Nevertheless Cæsar's eyes, after the first salutation with +Philip, fixed themselves on Kate's unfamliar costume. + +“Such worldly attire!” he muttered, following the girl round the kitchen +and blowing up his black gloves. “This caring for the miserable +body that will one day be lowered into the grave! What does the Book +say?--put my tall hat on the clane laff, Nancy. 'Let it not be the +outward adorning of putting on of apparel, but let it be the hidden man +of the heart.'” + +“But sakes alive, father,” said Grannie, loosening a bonnet like a +diver's helmet, “if it comes to that, what is Jeremiah saying, 'Can a +maid forget her ornaments?'” + +“It's like she can if she hasn't any to remember,” said Cæsar. “But +maybe the prophet Jeremiah didn't know the mothers that's in now.” + +“Chut, man! Girls are like birds, and the breed comes out in the +feathers,” said Grannie. + +“Where's she getting it then? Not from me at all,” said Cæsar. + +“Deed, no, man,” laughed Grannie, “considering the smart she is and the +rasonable good-looking.” + +“Hould your tongue, woman; it'll become you better,” said Cæsar. + +Philip rose to go. “You're time enough yet, sir,” cried Cæsar. “I was +for telling you of a job.” + +Some of the fishermen of Ramsey had been over on Saturday. Their season +was a failure, and they were loud in their protests against the trawlers +who were destroying the spawn. Cæsar had suggested a conference at +his house on the following Saturday of Ramsey men and Peel men, and +recommended Philip as an advocate to advise with them as to the best +means to put a stop to the enemies of the herring. Philip promised to be +there, and then went home to Auntie Nan. + +He told himself on the way that Kate was completely above her +surroundings, and capable of becoming as absolute a lady as ever lived +on the island, without a sign of her origin in look or speech, except +perhaps the rising inflexion in her voice which made the talk of the +true Manxwoman the sweetest thing in the world to listen to. + +Auntie Nan was sitting by the lamp, reading her chapter before going to +bed. + +“Auntie,” said Philip, “don't you think the tragedy in the life of +father was accidental? Due, I mean, to the particular characters of +grandfather and poor mother? Now, if the one had been less proud, less +exclusive, or the other more capable of rising with her husband----” + +“The tragedy was deeper than that, dear; let me tell you a story,” said +Auntie Nan, laying down her book. “Three days after your father left +Ballawhaine, old Maggie, the housemaid, came to my side at supper and +whispered that some one was wanting me in the garden. It was Thomas. Oh +dear! it was terrible to see him there, that ought to have been the +heir of everything, standing like a stranger in the dark beyond the +kitchen-door.” + +“Poor father!” said Philip. + +“'Whist, girl, come out of the light,' he whispered. 'There's a purse +with twenty pounds odd in my desk upstairs; get it, Nan, here's the +key.' I knew what he wanted the money for, but I couldn't help it; I got +him the purse and put ten pounds more of my own in it. 'Must you do it?' +I said. 'I must,' he answered. 'Your father says everybody will despise +you for this marriage,' I said. 'Better they should than I should +despise myself,' said he. 'But he calls it moral suicide,' I said. +'That's not so bad as moral murder,' he replied. 'He knows the island,' +I urged, 'and so do you, Tom, and so do I, and nobody can hold up his +head in a little place like this after a marriage like that.' 'All the +worse for the place,' said he, 'if it stains a man's honour for acting +honourably.'” + +“Father was an upright man,” interrupted Philip. “There's no question +about it, my father was a gentleman.” + +“'She must be a sweet, good girl, and worthy of you, or you wouldn't +marry her,' said I to father; 'but are you sure that you will be +happy and make her happy?' We shall have each other, and it is our own +affair,' said father.” + +“Precisely,” said Philip. + +“'But if there is a difference between you now,' I said, 'will it be +less when you are the great man we hope to see you some day?' 'A man is +not always thinking of success,' he answered. + +“My father was a great man already, Auntie,” burst out Philip. + +“He was shaken and I was ashamed, but I could not help it, I went on. +'Has the marriage gone too far?' I asked. 'It has never been mentioned +between us,' said he. 'Your father is old, and can't live long,' I +pleaded. 'He wants me to behave like a scoundrel,' he answered. 'Why +that, if the girl has no right to you yet?' I said, and he was silent. +Then I crept up and looked in at the window. 'See,' I whispered, 'he's +in the library. We'll take him by surprise. Come!' It was not to be. +There was a smell of tobacco on the air and the thud of a step on the +grass. 'Who's that?' I said. 'Who should it be,' cried father, 'but the +same spy again. I'll shake the life out of him yet as a terrier would +a rat. No use, girl,' he shouted hoarsely, facing towards the darkness, +'they're driving me to destruction.' 'Hush!' I said, and covered his +mouth with my hands, and his breath was hot, like fire. But it was +useless. He was married three days afterwards.” + +Philip resolved to see Kate no more. He must go to Sulby on Saturday +to meet the fishermen, but that would be a business visit; he need not +prolong it into a friendly one. All the week through he felt as if his +heart would break; but he resolved to conquer his feelings. He pitied +himself somewhat, and that helped him to rise above his error. + + + + +XV. + +On Saturday night he was early at Sulby. The bat-room was thronged with +fishermen in guernseys, sea-boots, and sou'-westers. They were all on +their feet together, twisting about like great congers on the quay, +drinking a little and smoking a great deal, thumping the table, and +all talking at once. “How've you done, Billy?”--“Enough to keep away the +divil and the coroner, and that's about all.”--“Where's Tom +Dug?”--“Gone to Austrilla.”--“Is Jimmy over to-day?”--“He's away +to Cleveland.”--“Gough, bless me, every Manx boy seems to be going +foreign.”--“That's where we'll all be after long and last, if we don't +stop these southside trawlers.” + +Philip went in and was received with goodwill and rough courtesy, but no +man abated a jot of his freedom of action or liberty of speech, and +the thumping and shouting were as loud as before. “Appeal to the +Receiver-General.”--“Chut! an ould woman with a face winking at you +like a roast potato.”--“Will we go to the Bishop, then?”--“A whitewashed +Methodist with a soul the size of a dried pea.”--“The Governor is the +proper person,” said Philip above the hubbub, “and he is to visit Peel +Castle next Saturday afternoon about the restorations. Let every Manx +fisherman who thinks the trawl-boats are enemies of the fish be there +that day. Then lay your complaint before the man whose duty it is to +inquire into all such grievances; and if you want a spokesman, I'm ready +to speak for you.”--“Bravo!”--“That's the ticket!” + +Then the meeting was at an end; the men went on with stories of the +week's fishing, stories of smugglers, stories of the Swaddlers (the +Wesleyans), stories of the totalers (teetotallers), and Philip made +for the door. When he got there, he began to reflect that, being in +the house, he ought to leave good-night with Cæsar and Grannie. Hardly +decent not to do so. No use hurting people's feelings. Might as well +be civil. Cost nothing anyway. Thus an overpowering compulsion in the +disguise of courtesy drew him again into Kate's company; but to-morrow +he would take a new turn. + +“Proud to see you, Mr. Philip,” said Cæsar. + +“The water's playing in the kettle; make Mr. Philip a cup of tay, +Nancy,” said Grannie. Cæsar was sitting back to the partition, +pretending to read out of a big Bible on his knees, but listening +with both ears and open mouth to the profane stories being told in the +bar-room. Kate was not in the kitchen, but an open book, face downwards, +lay on the chair by the turf closet. + +“What's this?” said Philip. “A French exercise-book! Whoever can it +belong to here?” + +“Aw, Kirry, of coorse,” said Grannie, “and sticking that close to it of +an everin that you haven't a chance to put a word on her.” + +“Vanity, sir, vanity, all vanity,” said Cæsar; and again he listened +hard. + +Philip's eyes began to blink. “Teaching herself French, is she? Has she +been doing it long, Grannie?” + +“Long enough, sir, three years or better, since poor Pete went away +maybe; and at the books for ever, grammars and tex' books, and I don't +know what.” + +Cæsar, with his ear at the glass, made an impatient gesture for silence, +but Grannie continued, “I don't know what for people should be larning +themselves foreign languages at all. For my part, there isn't one of +them bates the Manx itself for plainness. And aren't we reading, when +the Lord wanted to bring confusion on Noah and his disobedient sons and +grandsons at going up the Tower of Babel, he made them spake different +tongues?” + +“Good thing too,” snapped Cæsar, “if every poor man was bound to carry +his wife up with him.” + +Philip's eyes were streaming, and, unobserved, he put the lesson-book to +his lips. He had guessed its secret. The girl was making herself worthy +of him. God bless, her! + +Kate came downstairs in the dark dress and white collar of Sunday night. +She saw Philip putting down the book, lowered her head and blushed, +took up the volume, and smuggled it out of sight. Then Cæsar's curiosity +conquered his propriety and he ventured into the bar-room, Grannie came +and went between the counter and the fishermen, Nancy clicked about from +dairy to door, and Kate and Philip were left alone. + +“You were wrong the other night,” she said. “I have been thinking it +over, and you were quite, quite wrong.” + +“So?” + +“If a man marries a woman beneath him, he stoops to her, and to stoop to +her is to pity her, and to pity her is to be ashamed of her, and to be +ashamed of her would kill her. So you are wrong.” + +“Yes?” said Philip. + +“Yes,” said Kate, “but do you know what it ought to be? The _woman_ +ought to marry beneath herself, and the man _above_ himself; then as +much as the woman descends, the man rises, and so-----don't you see?” + +She faltered and stopped, and Philip said, “Aren't you talking +nonsense,' Kate?” + +“Indeed, sir!” + +Kate pretended to be angry at the rebuff, and pouted her lips, but her +eyes were beaming. + +“There is neither above nor below where there is real liking,” said +Philip. “If you like any one, and she is necessary to your life, that is +the sign of your natural equality. It is God's sign, and all the rest is +only man's book-keeping.” + +“You mean,” said Kate, trying to keep a grave mouth, “you mean that if +a woman belongs to some one she can like, and some one belongs to her, +that is being equal, and everything else is nothing? Eh?” + +“Why not?” said Philip. + +It was music to her, but she wagged her head solemnly and said, “I'm +sure you're wrong, Philip. I am, though. Yes, indeed I am. But it's no +use arguing. Not against you. Only----” + +The glorious choir of love-birds in her bosom were singing so loud that +she could say no more, and the irresistible one had his way. After a +while, she stuffed something into the fire. + +“What's that?” said Philip. + +“Oh, nothing,” she answered brightly. + +It was the French exercise-book. + + + + +XVI. + +Philip went home rebelling against his father's fate. It was accidental; +it was inevitable only in the Isle of Man. But perdition to the place +where a man could not marry the woman he loved if she chanced to be born +in the manger instead of the stable loft. Perdition to the land where a +man could not live unless he was a skunk or a cur. Thank God the world +was wide. + +That night he said to Auntie Nan, “Auntie, why didn't father go away +when he found the tide setting so strongly against him?” + +“He always meant to, but he never could,” said Auntie Nan. “A woman +isn't like a man, ready to pitch her tent here to-day and there +to-morrow. We're more like cats, dear, and cling to the places we're +used to, if they're only ruins of tumbling stones. Your mother wasn't +happy in the Isle of Man, but she wouldn't leave it. Your father +wouldn't go without her, and then there was the child. He was here for +weal or woe, for life or death. When he married his wife he made the +chain that bound him to the island as to a rock.” + +“It wouldn't be like that with Kate,” thought Philip. But did Auntie +know anything? Had somebody told her? Was she warning him? On Sunday +night, on the way home from church, she talked of his father again. + +“He came to see at last that it wasn't altogether his own affair +either,” she said. “It was the night he died. Your mother had been +unwell and father had sent for me. It was a dark night, and late, very +late, and they brought me down the hill from Lewaige Cottage with a +lantern. Father was sinking, but he _would_ get out of bed. We were +alone together then, he and I, except for you, and you were asleep in +your cot by the window. He made straight for it, and struggled down on +his knees at its side by help of the curtains. 'Listen,' he said, trying +to whisper, though he could not, for his poor throat was making noises. +You were catching your breath, as if sobbing in your sleep. 'Poor little +boy, he's dreaming,' said I; 'let me turn him on his side.' 'It's not +that,' said father; 'he went to sleep in trouble.'” + +“I remember it, Auntie,” said Philip. “Perhaps he had been trying to +tell me something.” + +“'My boy, my son, forgive me, I have sinned against you,' he said, and +he tried to reach over the cot rail and put his lips to your forehead, +but his poor head shook like palsy and bobbed down into your little +face. I remember you rubbed your nose with your little fist, but you did +not waken. Then I helped him back to bed, and the table with the +medicine glasses jingled by the trembling of his other hand. 'It's dark, +all, all dark, Nannie,' he said, 'sure some angel will bring me light,' +and I was so simple I thought he meant the lamp, for it was dying down, +and I lit a candle.” + +Philip went about his work that week as if the spirit of his father were +hovering over him, warning him when awake in words of love and pleading, +crying to him in his sleep in tones of anger and command, “Stand back; +you are at the edge of the precipice.” + +Nevertheless his soul rose in rebellion against this league as of the +past and the dead. It was founded in vanity, in the desire for glory and +success. Only let a man renounce the world and all that the world can +give, and he can be true to himself, to his heart's impulse, to his +honour, and to his love. He would deliberate no longer. He despised +himself for deliberating. If was the world against Kate, let the world +go to perdition. + + + + +XVII. + +On Saturday afternoon he was at Peel. It was a beautiful day; the sun +was shining, and the bay was blue and flat and quiet. The tide was down, +the harbour was empty of water, but full of smacks with hanging sails +and hammocks of nets and lines of mollags (bladders) up to the mast +heads. A flight of seagulls were fishing in the mud, and swirling +through the brown wings of the boats and crying. A flag floated over +the ruins of the castle, the church-bells were ringing, and the +harbour-masters were abroad in best blue and gold buttons. + +On the tilting-ground of the castle the fishermen had gathered, sixteen +hundred strong. There were trawlers among them, Manx, Irish, and +English, prowling through the crowd, and scooping up the odds and ends +of gossip as their boats on the bottom scraped up the little fish. +Occasionally they were observed by the herring-fishers, and then there +were high words and free fights. “Taking a creep round from Port le +Murrey are you, Dan?”--“Thought I'd put a sight on Peel to-day.”--“Bad +for your complexion, though; might turn it red, I'm thinking.”--“Strek +me with blood will you? I'd just like you to strek me, begough. I'd put +a Union Jack on your face as big as a griddle.” + +The Governor came, an elderly man, with a formidable air, an aquiline +nose, and cheeks pitted with small-pox. Philip introduced the fishermen +and told their grievance. Trawling destroyed immature fish, and so +contributed to the failure of the fisheries. They asked for power to +stop it in the bays of the island, and within three miles of the coast. + +“Then draft me a bill with that object, Mr. Christian,” said the +Governor, and the meeting ended with cheers for His Excellency, shouts +for Philip, and mutterings of contempt from the trawlers. “Didn't think +there was a man on the island could spake like it.”--“But hasn't your +fancy-man been rubbing his back agen the college?”--“I'd take lil tacks +home if I was yourself, Dan.”--“Drink much more and it'll be two feet +deep inside of you.” + +Philip was hurrying away under the crumbling portcullis, when a +deputation of the fishermen approached him. “What are we owing you, Mr. +Christian?” asked their spokesman. + +“Nothing,” answered Philip. + +“We thank you, sir, and you'll be hearing from us again. Meanwhile, a +word if you plaze, sir?” + +“What is it, men?” said Philip. + +“When a young man can spake like yonder, it's a gift, sir, and he's +houlding it in trust for something. The ould island's wanting a big +man ter'ble bad, and it hasn't seen the like since the days of your own +grandfather. Good everin, and thank you--good everin!” + +With that the rough fellows dismissed him at the ferry steps, and he +hastened to the market-place, where he had left his horse. On putting +up, he had seen Cæsar's gig tipped up in the stable-yard. It was now +gone, and, without asking questions, he mounted and made towards Ramsey. + +He took the old road by the cliffs, and as he cantered and galloped, he +hummed, and whistled, and sang, and slashed the trees to keep himself +from thinking. At the crest of the hill he sighted the gig in front, and +at Port Lady he came up with it. Kate was driving and Cæsar was nodding +and dozing. + +“You've been having a great day, Mr. Christian,” said Cæsar. “Wish I +could say the same for myself; but the heart of man is decaitful, sir, +and desperately wicked. I'm not one to clap people in the castle +and keep them from sea for debts of drink, and they're taking a +mane advantage. Not a penny did I get to-day, sir, and many a yellow +sovereign owing to me. If I was like some--now there's that Tom Raby, +Glen Meay. He saw Dan the Spy coming from the total meeting last night. +'Taken the pledge, Dan?' says he. 'Yes, I have,' says Dan. 'I'm plazed +to hear it,' says he; 'come in and I'll give you a good glass of rum +for it.' And Dan took the rum for taking the pledge, and there he was as +drunk as Mackilley in the castle this morning.” + +Philip listened as he rode, and a half-melancholy, half-mocking +expression played on his face. He was thinking of his grandfather, old +Iron Christian, brought into relation with his mother's father, Capt. +Billy Ballure, of the dainty gentility of Auntie Nan and the unctuous +vulgarity of the father of Kate. + +Cæsar grumbled himself to sleep at last, and then Philip was alone with +the girl, and riding on her side of the gig. She was quiet at first, but +a joyous smile lit up her face. + +“I was in the castle, too,” she said, with a look of pride. + +The sun went down over the waters behind them, and cast their brown +shadows on the road in front; the twilight deepened, the night came +down, the moon rose in their faces, and the stars appeared. They could +hear the tramp of the horses' hoofs, the roll of the gig wheels, the +wash and boom of the sea on their left, and the cry Of the sea-fowl +somewhere beneath. The lovelinese and warmth of the autumn night stole +over Kate, and she began to keep up a flow of merry chatter. + +“I can tell all the sounds of the fields in the darkness. By the +moonlight? No; but with my eyes shut, if you like. Now try me.” + +She closed her eyes and went on: “Do you hear that--that patter like +soft rain? That's oats nearly ripe for harvest. Do you hear that, +then--that pit-a-pat, like sheep going by on the street? That's wheat, +just ready. And there--that whiss, whiss, whiss? That's barley.” + +She opened her eyes: “Don't you think I'm very clever?” + +Philip felt an impulse to lean over the wheel and put his arms about the +girl's neck. + +“Take care,” she cried merrily; “your horse is shying.” + +He gazed at her face, lit up in the white moonlight. “How bright and +happy you seem, Kate!” he said with a shiver; and then he laid one hand +on the gig rail. + +Her eyelids quivered, her mouth twitched, and she answered gaily, “Why +not? Aren't you? You ought to be, you know. How glorious to succeed? It +means so much--new things to see, new houses to visit, new pleasures, +new friends----” + +Her joyous tones broke down in a nervous laugh at that last word, and he +replied, in a faltering voice, “That may be true of the big world over +yonder, Kate, but it isn't so in a little island like ours. To succeed +here is like going up the tower of Castle Rushen with some one locking +the doors on the stone steps behind you. At every storey the room +becomes less, until at the top you have only space to stand alone. Then, +if you should ever come down again, there's but one way for you--over +the battlements with a crash.” + +She looked up at him with startled eyes, and his own were large and full +of trouble. They were going through Kirk Michael by the house of the +Deemster, who was ill, and both drew rein and went slowly. Some acacias +in the garden slashed their broadswords in the night air, and a windmill +behind stood out against the moon like a gigantic bat. The black shadow +of the horses stepped beside them. + +“Are you feeling lonely to-night, Philip?” + +“I'm feeling----” + +“Yes?” + +“I'm feeling as if the dead and the living, the living and the dead--oh, +Kate, Kate, I don't know what I'm feeling.” + +She put her hand caressingly on the top of his hand. “Never mind, dear,” + she said softly; “I'll stand by you. You shan't be _alone_.” + + + + +XVIII. + +It was midday, then, on the tropic seas, and the horizon was closing in +with clouds as of blood and vapours of stifling heat. A steamship was +rolling in a heavy swell, under winds that were as hot as gusts from an +open furnace. Under its decks a man lay in an atmosphere of fever and +the sickening odour of bandages and stale air. Above the throb of the +engines and the rattle of the rudder chain he heard a step going by his +open door, and he called in a feeble voice that was cheerful and almost +merry, but yet the voice of a homesick boy-- + +“How many days from home, engineer?” + +“Not more than twenty now.” + +“Put on steam, mate; put it on. Wish I could be skipping below and +stoking up for you like mad.” + +As the ship rolled, the green reflection of the water and the red light +of the sky shot alternately through the porthole and lit up the berth +like firelight flashing in a dead house. + +“Ask the boys if they'll carry me on deck, sir--just for a breath of +fresh air.” + +The sailors came and carried him. “You can do anything for a chap like +that.” + +The big sun was straight overhead, weighing down on their shoulders, and +there was no shelter anywhere, for the shadows were under foot. + +“Slip out the sails, lads, and let's fly along. Wish I could tumble up +the rigging myself and look out from the yards same as a gull, but I'm +only an ould parrot chained down to my stick.” + +They left him, and he gazed out on the circle of water and the vapour +shaking over it like a veil. The palpitating air was making the circle +smaller every minute, but the world seem cruelly large for all that. He +was looking beyond the visible things; he was listening deeper than the +wash of the waves; he was dreaming, dreaming. Apparitions were floating +in the heat-clouds over him. Home! Its voices whispered at his ear, its +face peered into his eyes. But the hot winds came up and danced round +him; the air, the sea, the sky, the whole world, the utter universe +seemed afire; his eyes rolled upwards to his brow; he almost choked and +fainted. + +“Carry him below, poor fellow! He's got a good heart to think he'll ever +see home again. He'll never see it.” + +Half-way down the companion-ladder he opened his eyes with a look of +despair. Would God let him die after all? + + + + +XIX. + +Kate began to feel that Philip was slipping away from her. He loved her, +she was sure of that, but something was dragging them apart Her great +enemy was Philip's success. This was rapid and constant. She wanted to +rejoice in it; she struggled to feel glad and happy, and even proud. But +that was impossible. It was ungenerous, it was mean, but she could not +help it--she resented every fresh mark of Philip's advancement. + +The world that was carrying Philip up was carrying him away. She would +be left far below. It would be presumptuous to lift her eyes to him. +Visions came to her of Philip in other scenes than her scenes, among +ladies in drawing-rooms, beautiful, educated, clever, able to talk of +many things beyond her knowledge. Then she looked at herself, and +felt vexed with her hands, made coarse by the work of the farm; at her +father, and felt ashamed of the moleskin clothes he wore in the mill; at +her home, and flushed deep at the thought of the bar-room. + +It was small and pitiful, she knew that, and she shuddered under the +sense of being a meaner-hearted girl than she had ever thought. If +she could do something of herself to counteract the difference made +by Philip's success, if she could raise herself a little, she would be +content to keep behind, to let him go first, to see him forge ahead of +her, and of everybody, being only in sight and within reach. But she +could do nothing except writhe and rebel against the network of female +custom, or tear herself in the thorny thicket of female morals. + +Harvest had begun; half the crop of Glenmooar had been saved, a third +was in stook, and then a wet day had come and stopped all work in the +fields. On this wet day, in the preaching-room of the mill, amid forms +and desks, with the cranch of the stones from below, the wash of the +wheel from outside, and the rush of the uncrushed corn from above, Cæsar +sat rolling sugganes for the stackyard, with Kate working the twister, +and going backward before him, and half his neighbours sheltering from +the rain and looking on. + +“Thought I'd have a sight up and tell you,” said Kelly, the postman. + +“What's the news, Mr. Kelly?” said Cæsar. + +“The ould Dempster's dying,” said Kelly. + +“You don't say?” said everybody. + +“Well, as good as dying at ten minutes wanting eight o'clock this +morning,” said the postman. + +“The drink's been too heavy for the man,” said John, the clerk. + +“Wine is a serpent, and strong drink a mocker,” said Cæsar. + +“Who'll be the new Dempster, Mr. Niplightly,” said Jonaique. + +“Hm!” snuffled the constable, easing his helmet, “dat's a serious +matter, Mr. Jelly. We'll dake our time--well dake our time.” + +“Chut! There's only one man for it,” said Cæsar. + +“Perhaps yes, perhaps no,” said the constable. + +“Do you mane the young Ballawhaine, Mr. Cregeen?” said the postman. + +“Do I mane fiddlesticks!” said Cæsar. + +“Well, the man's father is at the Govenar reg'lar, they're telling me,” + said Kelly, “and Ross is this, and Ross is that--” + +“Every dog praises his own tail,” said Cæsar. + +“I'm not denying it, the man isn't fit--he has sold himself to the +devil, that's a fact----” + +“No, he hasn't,” said Cæsar, “the devil gets the like for nothing.” + +“But he's a Christian for all, and the Christians have been Dempsters +time out of time----” + +“Is he the only Christian that's in, then, eh?” said Cæsar. “Go on, +Kate; twist away.” + +“Is it Mr. Philip? Aw, I'm saying nothing against Mr. Philip,” said the +postman. + +“You wouldn't get lave in this house, anyway,” said Cæsar. + +“Aw, a right gentleman and no pride at all,” said the postman. “As free +and free with a poor man, and no making aisy either. I've nothing agen +him myself. No, but a bit young for a Dempster, isn't he? Just a taste +young, as the man said, eh?” + +“Older than the young Ballawhaine, anyway,” said John, the clerk. + +“Aw, make him Dempster, then. I'm raising no objection,” said Mr. Kelly. + +“Go on, girl. Does that twister want oiling? Feed it, woman, feed it,” + said Cæsar. + +“His father should have been Dempster before him,” said John, the clerk. +“Would have been too, only he went crooked when he married on yonder +woman. She's through though, and what more natural----” + +The rope stopped again, and Kate's voice, hard and thick, came from the +farther end of it. “His mother being dead, eh?” + +“It was the mother that done for the father, anyway,” said the clerk. + +“Consequently,” said Kate, “he is to praise God that his mother is +gone!” + +“That girl wants a doctor,” muttered Jonaique. + +“The man couldn't drag the woman up after him,” began the clerk. “It's +always the way----” + +“Just that,” said Kate, with bitter irony. + +“Of coorse, I'm not for saying it was the woman's fault entirely----” + +“Don't apologise for her,” said Kate. “She's gone and forgotten, and +that being so, her son has now a chance of being Deemster.” + +“So he has,” shouted Cæsar, “and not second Dempster only, but first +Dempster itself in time, and go on with the twister.” + +Kate laughed loudly, and cried, “Why don't you keep it up when your +hand's in? First Deemster Christian, and then Sir Philip Christian, and +then Lord Christian, and then----But you're talking nonsense, and you're +a pack of tattlers. There's no thought of making Philip Christian a +Deemster, and no hope of it and no chance of it, and I trust there never +will be.” + +So saying, she flung the twister on the floor and rushed out of the +mill, sobbing hysterically. + +“Dr. Clucas is wonderful for females and young girls,” said Jonaique. + +“It's that Ross again,” muttered Cæsar. + +“And he'll have her yet,” said Kelly, the postman. + +“I'd see her dead first,” said Cæsar. “It would be the jaws of hell and +the mouth of Satan.” + +That she who loved Philip to distraction should be the first to abuse +and defame him was agony near to madness, for Kate knew where she stood. +It was not merely that Philip's success was separating them, not merely +that the conventions of life, its usages, its manners, and its customs +were putting worlds between them. The pathos of the girl's position +was no accidental thing. It was a deeper, older matter; it was the same +to-day as it had been yesterday and would be to-morrow; it began in the +garden of Eden and would go on till the last woman died---it was the +natural inferiority of woman in relation to man. + +She had the same passions as Philip, and was moved by the same love. +But she was not free. Philip alone was free. She had to wait on Philip's +will, on Philip's word. She saw Philip slipping away from her, but she +could not snatch at him before he was gone; she could not speak first; +she could not say, “I love you; stay with me!” She was a woman, only a +woman! How wretched to be a woman! How cruel! + +But ah! the dear delicious thought! It came stealing up into her heart +when the red riot was nearly killing her. What a glorious thing it +was to be a woman after all! What a powerful thing! What a lovely and +beloved thing! To rule the king, being the slave, was sweeter than to be +the king himself. That was woman's place. It was where heaven itself +had put her from the beginning until now. What weapons had it given +her! Beauty! Charm! Love! The joy of it! To be the weak and overcome the +strong! To be nothing in the battle of life, and yet conqueror of all +the world! + +Kate vowed that, come what would, Philip should never leave her. + + + + +XX. + +On the day when the last of the harvest is saved in the Isle of Man, the +farmer gives a supper to his farm-people, and to the neighbours who +have helped him to cut and house it. This supper, attended by simple and +beautiful ceremonies, is called the Melliah. The parson may be asked to +it, and if there is a friend of position and free manners, he also is +invited. Cæsar's Melliah fell within a week of the rope-making in the +mill, and partly to punish Kate, partly to honour himself, he asked +Philip to be present. + +“He'll come,” thought Kate with secret joy, “I'm sure he'll come;” and +in this certainty, when the day of Melliah came, she went up to her room +to dress for it. She was to win Philip that day or lose him for ever. +It was to be her trial day--she knew that. She was to fight as for her +life, and gain or lose everything. It was to be a battle royal between +all the conventions of life, all the network of female custom, all the +inferiority of a woman's position as God himself had suffered it to be, +and one poor girl. + +She began to cry, but struggling with her sadness, she dashed the tears +from her glistening eyes. What was there to cry about? Philip _wanted_ +to love her, and he should, he must. + +It was a glorious day, and not yet more than two o'clock. Nancy had +washed up the dinner things, the fire-irons were polished, the boots and +spare whips were put up on, the lath, the old hats like lines of heads +on a city gate were hung round the kitchen walls, the hearthrug was +down, the turf was piled up on the fire, the kettle was singing from the +slowrie, and the whole house was taking its afternoon nap. + +Kate's bedroom looked over the orchard and across the stackyard up the +glen. She could see the barley stack growing in the haggard; the laden +cart coming down the glen road with the driver three decks up over the +mare, now half smothered and looking suddenly little, like a snail under +the gigantic load; and beyond the long meadow and the Bishop's bridge, +the busy fields dotted with the yellow stooks and their black shadows +like a castle's studded doors. + +When she had thrown off her blue-black dress to wash her arms and +shoulders and neck were bare. She caught sight of herself in the glass, +and laughed with delight. The years had brought her a fuller flow of +life. She was beautiful, and she knew it. And Philip knew it too, but +he should know it to day as he had never known it before. She folded her +arms in their roundness over her bosom in its fulness and walked up and +down the little room over the sheep-skin rugs, under the turfy scraas, +glowing in the joy of blooming health and conscious loveliness. Then she +began to dress. + +She took from a drawer two pairs of stockings, one black and the other +red, and weighed their merits with moral gravity--which? The red had it, +and then came the turn of the boots. There was a grand new pair, with +countless buttons, two toecaps like two flowers, and an upward curve +like the arm of a glove. She tried them on, bent back and forward, but +relinquished them with a sigh in favour of plain shoes cut under the +ankles and tied with tape. + +Her hair was a graver matter. Its tangled curls had never satisfied her. +She tried all means to bring them into subjection; but the roll on top +was ridiculous, and the roll behind was formal. She attempted long waves +over the temples. It was impossible. With a lash-comb she dragged her +hair back to its natural lawlessness, and when it fell on her forehead +and over her ears and around her white neck in little knowing rings +that came and went, and peeped out and slid back, like kittens at +hide-and-seek, she laughed and was content. + +From a recess covered by a shawl running on a string she took down her +bodice. It was a pink blouse, loose over the breast, like hills of +red sand on the shore, and loose, too, over the arms, but tight at +the wrist. When she put it on it lit up her head like a gleam from the +sunset, and her eyes danced with delight. + +The skirt was a print, with a faint pink flower, the sash was a band of +cotton of the colour of the bodice, and then came the solemn problems +of the throat. It was round, and full, and soft, and like a tower. She +would have loved to leave it bare, but dared not. Out of a drawer under +the looking-glass she took a string of pearls. They were a present from +Kimberley, and they hung over her fingers a moment and then slipped +back. A white silk handkerchief, with a watermark, was chosen instead. +She tied it in a sailor's knot, with the ends flying loose, and the +triangular corner lying down her back. + +Last of all, she took out of a box a broad white straw hat, like +an oyster shell, with a silver-grey ribbon, and a sweeping ostrich +feather.. She looked at it a moment, blew on it, plucked at its ribbon, +lifted it over her head, held it at poise there, dropped it gently on to +her hair, stood back from the glass to see it, and finally tore it off +and sent it skimming on to the bed. + +The substitute was her everyday sun-bonnet, which had been lying on the +floor by the press. It was also of pale pink, with spots on its print +like little shells on a big scallop. When she had tossed it over her +black curls, leaving the strings to fall on her bosom, she could not +help but laugh aloud. + +After all, she was dressed exactly the same as on other days of life, +except Sunday, only smarter, perhaps, and fresher maybe. + +The sun-bonnet was right though, and she began to play with it. It was +so full of play; it lent itself to so many moods. It could speak; it +could say anything. She poked it to a point, as girls do when the sun +is hot, by closing its mouth over the tip of her nose, leaving only a +slumberous dark cave visible, through which her black eyes gleamed and +her eyelashes shone. She tied the strings under her chin, and tipped +the bonnet back on to her neck, as girls will when the breeze is cool, +leaving her hair uncovered, her mouth twitching merrily, and her head +like a nymph-head in an aureole. She took it off and tossed it on her +arm, the strings still knotted, swinging it like a basket, then wafting +it like a fan, and walking as she did so to and fro in the room, the +floor creaking, her print frock crinkling, and she herself laughing with +the thrill of passion vibrating and of imagined things to come. + +Then she went downstairs with a firm and buoyant step, her fresh lithe +figure aglow with young blood and bounding health. + +At the gate of the “haggard” she met Nancy Joe coming out of the +washhouse. + +“Lord save us alive!” exclaimed Nancy. “If I ever wanted to be a man +until this day!” + +Kate kissed and hugged her, then fled away to the Melliah field. + + + + +XXI. + +Philip, in Douglas, had received the following communication from +Government House:-- + +“His Excellency will be obliged to Mr. Philip Christian if he will +not leave the island for the present without acquainting him of his +destination.” + +The message was a simple one: it said little, and involved and +foreshadowed nothing, but it threw Philip into a condition of great +excitement. To relieve his restlessness by giving way to it, he went out +to walk. It was the end of the tourist season, and the _Ben-my-Chree_ +was leaving the harbour. Newsboys, burrowing among the crowds on +the pier to sell a Manx evening paper, were crying, “Illness of the +Deemster--serious reports.” + +Philip's hair seemed to rise from his head. The two things came together +in his mind. With an effort to smudge out the connection he turned back +to his lodgings, looking at everything that his eyes fell on in the +rattling streets, speaking to everybody he knew, but seeing nothing and +hearing nobody. The beast of life had laid its claws on him. + +Back in his rooms, he took out of his pocket a packet which Auntie Nan +had put in his hand when he was leaving Ramsey. It was a bundle of his +father's old letters to his sister cousin, written from London in the +days when he was studying law and life was like the opening dawn. “The +ink is yellow now,” said Auntie Nan; “it was black then, and the hand +that wrote them is cold. But the blood runs red in them yet. Read them, +Philip,” she said with a meaning look, and then he was sure she knew of +Sulby. + +Philip read his father's letters until it was far into the night, and he +had gone through every line of them. They were as bright as sunshine, as +free as air, easy, playful, forcible, full of picture, but, above all, +egotistical, proud with the pride of intellectuality, and vain with the +certainty of success. It was this egotism that fascinated Philip. He +sniffed it up as a colt sniffs the sharp wind. There was no need to make +allowances for it. The castles which his father had been building in +the air were only as hovels to the golden palaces which his son's eager +spirit was that night picturing. Philip devoured the letters. It was +almost as if he had written them himself in some other state of being. +The message from Government House lay on a table at his right, and +sometimes he put his open hand over it as he sat close under the lamp on +a table at his left and read on:-- + +... “Heard old Broom in the House last night, and today I lunched +with him at Tabley's. They call him an orator and the king of +conversationalists. He speaks like a pump, and talks like a bottle +running water. No conviction, no sincerity, no appeal. Civil enough to +me though, and when he heard that father was a Deemster, he told me the +title meant Doomster, and then asked me if I knew the meaning of 'House +of Keys,' and said it had its origin in the ancient Irish custom +of locking the muniment chests with twenty-four keys, whereof each +counsellor kept one. When he had left us Tabley asked if he wasn't a +wonderful man, and if he didn't know something of everything, and I +said, 'Yes, except the things of which I knew a little, and of them he +knew nothing.'... My pen runs, runs. But, Nannie, my little Nannie, if +this is what London calls a great man, I'll kick the ball like a toy +before me yet.” + +... “So you are wondering where I am living--in man-sion or attic! +Behold me then in Brick Court, Temple, second floor. Goldsmith wrote the +'Vicar' on the third, but I've not got up to that yet. His rooms were +those immediately above me. I seem to see him coming down past my door +in that wonderful plum-coloured coat. And sitting here at night I think +of him--the sudden fear, the solitary death, then these stairs thronged +with his pensioners, the mighty Burke pushing through, Reynolds with his +ear-trumpet, and big 'blinking Sam,' and last of all the unknown grave, +God knows where, by the chapel wall. Poor little Oliver! They say it +was a women that was 'in' at the end. No more of the like now, no more +debts, no more vain 'talk like poor Poll:' the light's out--all still +and dark.” + +... “How's my little Nannie? Does she still keep a menagerie for sick +dogs and lost cats? And how's the parson-gull with the broken wing, +and does he still strut like Parson Kis-sack in his surplice? I was at +Westminster Hall yesterday. It was the great trial of Mitchell, M. P., +who forged his father's will. Stevens defended--bad, bad, bad, smirking +all the while with small facetiæ. But Denman's summing up--oh! oh! such +insight, such acuteness! It was wonderful. I had a seat in the gallery. +The grand old hall was a thrilling scene--the dense throng, the upturned +faces, the counsel, the judges, the officers of court, and then the +windows, the statues, the echo of history that made every stone and +rafter live--Oh, Nan, Nan, listen to me! If I live I'll sit on the bench +there some day--I will, so help me God!” + +When Philip had finished his father's letters, he was on the heights, +and poor Kate was left far below, out of reach and out of sight. +Hitherto his ambitions had been little more than the pale shadow of his +father's hopes, but now they were his own realities. + + + + +XXII. + +Next morning the letter came from Cæsar inviting him to the Melliah, +and then he thought of Kate more tenderly. She would suffer, she would +cry--it would make his heart bleed to see her; but must he for a few +tears put by the aims of a lifetime? If only Pete had been alive! +If only Pete were yet to come home! He grew hot and ashamed when he +remembered the time, so lately past, when the prayer of his secret heart +would have been different. It was so easy now to hate himself for such +evil impulses. + +Philip decided to go to the Melliah. It would give him the chance he +wanted of breaking off the friendship finally. More than friendship +there had never been, except secretly, and that could not count. He knew +he was deceiving himself; he felt an uneasy sense of loss of honour and +a sharp pang of tender love as often as Kate's face rose up before him. + +On the day of the Melliah he set off early, riding by way of St. John's +that he might inquire at Kirk Michael about the Deemster.. He found the +great man's house a desolate place. The gate was padlocked, and he had +to clamber over it; the acacias slashed above him going down the path, +and the fallen leaves encumbered his feet At the door, which was shut, +he rang, and before it was opened to him an old woman put her untidy +head out of a little window at the side. + +“It's scandalous the doings that's here, sir,” she whispered. “The +Dempster's gone into 'sterics with the drink, and the lil farmer fellow, +Billiam Cowley, is over and giving him as much as he wants, and driving +everybody away.” + +“Can I speak to him?” said Philip. + +“Billiam? It isn't fit. He'll blackguard you mortal, and the Dempster +himself is past it. Just sitting with the brandy and drinking and +drinking, and ateing nothing; but that dirt brought up on the Curragh +shouting for beefstakes morning and night, and having his dinner laid on +a beautiful new white sheet as clane as a bed.” + +From the ambush of a screen before an open door, Philip looked into the +room where the Deemster was killing himself. The window shutters were up +to keep out the daylight; candles were burning in the necks of bottles +on the mantelpiece; a fire smouldered in a grate littered with paper +and ashes; a coarse-featured man was eating ravenously at the table, +a chop-bone in his fingers, and veins like cords moving on his low +forehead--and the Deemster himself, judge of his island since the death +of Iron Christian, was propped up in a chair, with a smoking glass on a +stool beside him, and a monkey perched on his shoulder. “Turn them out, +neck and crop, Dempster; the women are all for robbing a man,” said the +fellow; and a husky, eaten-out voice replied to him with a grunt and a +laugh, “H'm! That's only what you're doing yourself, then, you rascal, +and if I'd let the right one in long ago you wouldn't be here now--nor +I neither, would I, Jacko?” The tail of the monkey flapped on the +Deemster's breast, and Philip crept away with a shiver. + +The sun was shining brightly outside the house, and the air was fresh +and sweet. Remounting his horse, which was neighing and stamping at the +gate, Philip rode hard to bring back a sense of warmth. At the “Fairy” + he alighted and put up, and saw Grannie, who was laying tables in the +mill. + +“I'm busy as Trap's wife,” she said, “and if you were the Govenar itself +you wouldn't get lave to spake to me now. Put a sight on himself on the +field yonder, the second meadow past the Bishop's bridge, and come back +with the boys to supper.” + +Philip found the Melliah field. Two-score workers, men, women, and +children, a cart and a pair of horses were scattered over it. Where the +corn had been cut the day before the stubble had been woven overnight +into a white carpet of cobwebs, which neither sun nor step of man had +yet dispelled. There were the smell of the straw, the cawing of the +rooks in the glen, the hissing to the breeze of the barley still +standing, the swish of the scythe and the gling of the sickle, the +bending and rising of the shearers, the swaying of the binders dragging +the sheaves, the gluck of the wheels of the cart, the merry head of a +child peeping out of a stook like a young bird out of the broken egg, +and a girl in scarlet, whom Philip recognised, standing at the farthest +hedge, and waving the corn band with which she was tieing to some one +below. + +Philip vaulted into the field, and was instantly seized by every woman +working in it, except Kate, tied up with the straw ropes, and only +liberated on paying the toll of an intruder. + +“But I've come to work,” he protested, and Cæsar who, was plotting the +last rigs of the harvest, paired him with Kate and gave him a sickle. +“He's a David, he'll smite down his thousands/,” said Cæsar. Then +cocking his eye up the field, “the Ballabeg for leader,” he cried, “he's +a plate-ribbed man. And let ould Maggie take the butt along with him. +Jemmy the Red for the after-rig, and Robbie to follow Mollie with the +cart Now ding-dong, boys, bend your backs and down with it.” + +Kate had not looked up when Philip came into the field, but she had +seen him come, and she gave a little start when he took his place in his +shirt-sleeves beside her. He used some conventional phrases which she +scarcely answered, and then nothing was heard but the sounds of the +sickle and the corn. She worked steadily for some time, and he looked +up at her at intervals with her round bare arms and supple waist and +firm-set foot and tight red stocking. Two butterflies tumbling in the +air played around her sun bonnet and a lady-clock settled on her wrist. + +Time was called for rest as Nancy Joe came through the gate bringing a +basket with bottles and a can. + +“The belly's a malefactor that forgets former kindness,” said Cæsar; +“ate and drink.” + +Then the men formed a group about the ale, the older women drank tea, +the children making bands were given butter-milk, and the younger women +with babes went cooing and clucking to the hedge where the little ones +lay nuzzled up and unattended, some asleep in shawls, some awake on +their backs and grabbing at the wondrous forests of marguerites towering +up beside them, and all crying with one voice at sight of the breast, +which the mothers were as glad to give as they to take. + +The rooks cawed in the glen, there was a hot hum of bees, and a company +of starlings passed overhead, glittering in the sunlight like the scales +of a herring. + +“They're taiching us a lesson,” said Cæsar. “They're going together over +the sea; but there's someones on earth would sooner go to heaven itself +solitary, and take joy if they found themselves all alone and the cock +of the walk there.” + +Kate and Philip stood and talked where they had been shearing quietly, +simply, without apparent interest, and meanwhile the workers discussed +them. + +First the men: “He works his siggle like a man though.”--“A stout boy +anyway; give him practice and he'd shear many a man in bed.” Then the +women: “She's looking as bright as a pewter pot, and she's all so pretty +as the Govenar's daughter too.”--“Got a good heart, though. Only last +week she had word of Pete, and look at the scarlet perricut.” Finally +both men and women: “Lave her alone, mother; it's that Ross +that's wasting the woman.”--“Well, if I was a man I'd know my +tack.”--“Wouldn't trust. It comes with Cæsar anyway; the Lord prospers +him; she'll have her pickings. Nothing bates religion in this world. +It's like going to the shop with an ould Manx shilling--you get your +pen'orth of taffy and twelve pence out.”--“Lend's a hand with the jough +then, boy. None left? Aw, Cæsar's wonderful religious, but there's never +much lavings of ale with him.” + +Cæsar was striding through the stooks past Philip and Kate. + +“Will it thrash well, Mr. Cregeen?” said Philip. + +“Eight bolls to the acre maybe, but no straw to spake of, sir,” said +Cæsar. “Now, boys, let the weft rest on the last end, finish your work.” + +The workers fell to again, and the sickle of the leader sang round his +head as he hacked and blew and sent off his breath in spits until the +green grass springing up behind him left only a triangular corner of +yellow corn. Fore-rig and the after-rig took a tussle together, and +presently nothing was standing of all the harvest of Glenmooar but one +small shaft of ears a yard wide or less. Then the leaders stopped, and +all the shearers of the field came up and cast down their sickles into +the soil in a close circle, making a sheaf of crescent moons. + +“Now for the Melliah,” said Cæsar. “Who's to be Queen?” + +There was a cry for Kate, and she sailed forward buoyantly, fresh still, +warm with her work, and looking like the afterglow from the sunset in +the lengthening shadows from the west. + +“Strike them from their legs, Kirry,” cried Nancy Joe, and Kate drew up +one of the sickles, swept her left arm over the standing corn, and at a +single stroke of her right brought the last ears to the ground. + +Then there was a great shout. “Hurrah for the Mel-liah!” It rang through +the glen and echoed in the mountains. Grannie heard it in the valley, +and said to herself, “Cæsar's Melliah's took.” + +“Well, we've gathered the ripe corn, praise His name,” said Cæsar, “but +what shall be done at the great gathering for unripe Christians?” + +Kate lifted her last sheaf and tied it about with a piece of blue +ribbon, and Philip plucked the cushag (the ragwort) from the hedge, and +gave it her to put in the band. + +This being done; the Queen of the Melliah stepped back, feeling Philip's +eyes following her, while the oldest woman shearer came forward. + +“I've a crown-piece, here that's being lying in my pocket long enough, +Joney,” said Cæsar with an expansive air, and he gave the woman her +accustomed dole. + +She was a timid, shrinking creature, having a face walled with wrinkles, +and wearing a short blue petticoat, showing heavy dull boots like a +man's, and thick black stockings. + +Then the young fellows went racing over the field, vaulting the stooks, +stretching a straw rope for the girls to jump over, heightening and +tightening it to trip them up, and slacking and twirling it to make them +skip. And the girls were falling with a laugh, and leaping up again +and flying off like the dust, tearing their frocks and dropping their +sun-bonnets as if the barley grains they had been reaping had got into +their blood. + +In the midst of this maddening frolic, while Cæsar and the others were +kneeling behind the barley stack, Kate snatched Philip's hat from his +head and shot like a gleam into the depths of the glen. + +Philip dragged up his coat by one of its arms and fled after her. + + + + +XXIII. + +Sulby Glen is winding, soft, rich, sweet, and exquisitely beautiful. +A thin thread of blue water, laughing, babbling, brawling, whooping, +leaping, gliding, and stealing down from the mountains; great boulders +worn smooth and ploughed hollow by the wash of ages; wet moss and lichen +on the channel walls; deep, cool dubbs; tiny reefs; little cascades of +boiling foam; lines of trees like sentinels on either side, making the +light dim through the overshadowing leafage; gaunt trunks torn up by +winds and thrown across the stream with their heads to the feet of their +fellows; the golden fuschia here, the green trammon there; now and again +a poor old tholthan, a roofless house, with grass growing on its kitchen +floor; and over all the sun peering down with a hundred eyes into the +dark and slumberous gloom, and the breeze singing somewhere up in the +tree-tops to the voice of the river below. + +Kate had run out on the stem of one of the fallen trees, and there +Philip found her, over the middle of the stream, laughing, dancing, +waving his hat in one hand, and making sweeping bows to her reflection +in the water below. + +“Come back,” he cried. “You terrible girl, you'll fall. Sit down +there--don't torment me, sit down.” + +After a curtsey to him she turned her attention to her skirts, wound +them about her ankles, sat on the trunk, and dangled her shapely feet +half an inch over the surface of the stream. + +Then Philip had time to observe that the other end of the tree did +not reach the opposite bank, but dipped short into the water. So he +barricaded his end by sitting on it, and said triumphantly: “My hat, if +you please.” + +Kate looked and gave a little cry of alarm and then a chuckle, and then +she said-- + +“You thought you'd caught me, didn't you? You can't, though,” and she +dropped on to a boulder from which she might have skipped ashore. + +“I can't, can't I?” said Philip; and he twisted a smaller boulder on his +side, so that Kate was surrounded by water and cut off from the bank. +“My hat now, madam,” he said with majestic despotism. 10 + +She would not deliver it, so he pretended to leave her where she was. +“Good-bye, then; good evening,” he cried over the laughter of the +stream, and turned away a step bareheaded. + +A moment later his confidence was dashed. When he turned his head back +Kate had whipped off her shoes and stockings, and was ramming the one +inside the other. + +“What are you doing?” cried Philip. + +“Catch this--and this,” she said, flinging the shoes across to him. Then +clapping his straw hat on the crown of her sun-bonnet, she tucked up her +skirts with both hands and waded ashore. + +“What a clever boy you are! You thought you'd caught me again, didn't +you?” she said. + +“I've caught your shoes, anyway,” said Philip, “and until you give me my +hat I'll stick to them.” + +She was on the shingle, but in her bare feet, and could not make a step. + +“My shoes, please?” she pleaded. + +“My hat first,” he answered. + +“Take it.” + +“No; you must give it me.” + +“Never! I'll sit here all night first,” said Kate. + +“I'm willing,” said Philip. + +They were sitting thus, the one bare-headed, the other with bare feet, +and on the same stone, as if seats in the glen were scarce, when there +came the sound of a hymn from the field they had left, and then it was +agreed by way of mutual penalty that Kate should put on Philip's hat on +condition that Philip should be required to put on Kate's shoes. + +At the next moment Philip, suddenly sobered, was reproaching himself +fiercely. What was he doing? He had come to tell Kate that he should +come no more, and this was how he had begun! Yesterday he was in +Douglas reading his father's letters, and here he was to-day, forgetting +himself, his aims in life, his duties, his obligations--everything. +“Philip,” he thought, “you are as weak as water. Give up your plans; you +are not fit for them; abandon your hopes--they are too high for you.” + +“How solemn we are all at once!” said Kate. + +The hymn (a most doleful strain, dragged out to death on every note) was +still coming from the Melliah field, and she added, slyly, shyly, with +a mixture of boldness and nervousness, “Do you think this world is so +very bad, then?” + +“Well--aw--no,” he faltered, and looking up he met her eye, and they +both laughed. + +“It's all nonsense, isn't it?” she said, and they began to walk down the +glen. + +“But where are we going?” + +“Oh, we'll come out this way just as well.” + +The scutch grass, the long rat-tail, and the golden cushag were swishing +against his riding-breeches and her print dress. “I must tell her now,” + he thought. In the narrow places she went first, and he followed with a +lagging step, trying to begin. “Better prepare her,” he thought. But he +could think of no commonplace leading up to what he wished to say. + +Presently, through a tangle of wild fuchsia, there was a smell of +burning turf in the air and the sound of milking into a pail, and then a +voice came up surprisingly as from the ground, saying: + +“Aisy on the thatch, Miss Cregeen, ma'am.” + +It was old Joney, the shearer, milking her goat, and Kate had stepped +on to the roof of her house without knowing it, for the little place was +low and opened from the water's edge and leaned against the bank. + +Philip made some conventional inquiries, and she answered that she had +been thirty years there, and had one son living with her, and he was an +imbecile. + +“There was once a flock at me, and I was as young as you are then, miss, +and all as happy; but they're laving me one by one, except this one, and +he isn't wise, poor boy.” + +Philip tried to steel his heart. “It is cruel,” he thought, “it will +hurt her; but what must be, must be.” She began to sing and went +carolling down the glen, keeping two paces in front of him. He followed +like an assassin meditating the moment to strike. “He is going to say +something,” she thought, and then she sang louder. + +“Kate,” he called huskily. + +But she only clapped her hands, and cried in a voice of delight, “The +echo! Here's the echo! Let's shout to it.” + +Her kindling features banished his purpose for the time, and he +delivered himself to her play. Then she called up the gill, “Ec--ho! +Ec--ho!” and listened, but there was no response, and she said, “It +won't answer to its own name. What shall I call?” + +“Oh, anything,” said Philip. + +“Phil--ip! Phil--ip!” she called, and then said pettishly, “No, Philip +won't hear me either.” She laughed. “He's always so stupid though, and +perhaps he's asleep.” + +“More this way,” said Philip. “Try now.” + +“You try.” + +Philip took up the call. “Kate!” he shouted, and back came the answer, +_Ate!_ “Kate--y!”--_Ate--y_. + +“Ah! how quick! Katey's a good girl. Hark how she answers you,” said +Kate. + +They walked a few steps, and Kate called again, “Philip!” There was no +answer. “Philip is stubborn; he won't have anything to do with me,” said +Kate. + +Then Philip called a second time, “Katey!” And back came the echo as +before. “Well, that's too bad. Katey is--yes, she's actually _following_ +you!” + +Philip's courage oozed out of him. “Not yet,” he thought. +_Traa-dy-liooar_--time enough. “After supper, when everybody is going! +Outside the mill, in the half light of candles within and darkness +without! It will sound so ordinary then, 'Good-bye! Haven't you heard +the news? Auntie Nan is reconciled at last to leaving Ballure and +joining me in Douglas.' That's it; so simple, so commonplace.” + +The light was now coming between the trees on the closing west in long +swords of sunset red. They could hear the jolting of the laden cart on +its way down the glen. The birds were fairly rioting overhead, and all +sorts of joyous sounds filled the air. Underfoot there were long ferns +and gorse, which caught at her crinkling dress sometimes, and then he +liberated her and they laughed. A trailing bough of deadly nightshade +was hanging from the broken head of an old ash stump, whose wasted feet +were overgrown by two scarlet-tipped toadstools, and she plucked a long +tendril of it and wound it about her head, tipping her sun-bonnet back, +and letting the red berries droop over her dark hair to her face. Then +she began to sing, + + O were I monarch o' the globe, + Wi' thee to reign, wi' thee to reign. + +Radiant gleams shot out of her black pupils, and flashes of love like +lightning passed from her eye to his. + +Then he tried to moralise. “Ah!” he said, out of the gravity of his +wisdom, “if one could only go on for ever like this, living from minute +to minute! But that's the difference between a man and a woman. A woman +lives in the world of her own heart. If she has interests, they centre +there. But a man has his interests outside his affections. He is +compelled to deny himself, to let the sweetest things go by.” + +Kate began to laugh, and Philip ended by laughing too. + +“Look!” she cried, “only look.” + +On the top of the bank above them a goat was skirmishing. He was a +ridiculous fellow; sometimes cropping with saucy jerks, then kicking up +his heels, as if an invisible imp had pinched him, then wagging his rump +and laughing in his nostrils. + +“As I was saying,” said Philip, “a man has to put by the pleasures of +life. Now here's myself, for example. I am bound, do you know, by a kind +of duty--a sort of vow made to the dead, I might say------” + +“I'm sure he's going to say something,” thought Kate. The voice of his +heart was speaking louder and quicker than his halting tongue. She saw +that a blow was coming, and looked about for the means to ward it off. + +“The fairy's dubb!” she cried suddenly, and darted from his side to the +water's edge. + +It was a little round pool, black as ink, lying quiet and apparently +motionless under a noisy place where the waters swirled and churned over +black moss, and the stream ran into the dark. Philip had no choice but +to follow her. + +“Cut me a willow! Your penknife! Quick, sir, quick! Not that old +branch--a sapling. There, that's it. Now you shall hear me tell my own +fortune.” + +“An ordeal is it?” said Philip. + +“Hush! Be quiet, still, or little Phonodoree wont listen. Hush, now +hush!” + +With solemn airs, but a certain sparkle in her eyes, she went down on +her knees by the pool, stretched her round arm over the water, passed +the willow bough slowly across its surface, and recited her incantation: + + Willow bough, willow bough, which of the four, + Sink, circle, or swim, or come floating ashore? + Which is the fortune you keep for my life, + Old maid or young mistress or widow or wife? + +With the last word she flung the willow bough on to the pool, and sat +back on her heels to watch it as it moved slowly with the motion of the +water. + +“Bravo!” cried Philip. + +“Be quiet. It's swimming. No, it's coming ashore.” + +“It's wife, Kate. No, it's widow. No, it's----” + +“Do be serious. Oh, dear! it's going--yes, it's going round. Not that +either. No, it has--yes, it has------oh!” + +“Sunk!” said Philip, laughing and clapping his hands. “You're doomed to +be an old maid, Kate. Phonodoree says so.” + +“Cruel Brownie! I'm vexed that I bothered with him,” said Kate, dropping +her lip. Then nodding to her reflection in the water where the willow +bough had disappeared, she said, “Poor little Katey! He might have given +you something else. Anything but that dear, eh?” + +“What,” laughed Philip, “crying? Because Phonodoree--never!” + +Kate leapt up with averted face. “What nonsense you are talking!” she +said. + +“There are tears in your eyes, though,” said Philip. + +“No wonder, either. You're so ridiculous. And if I'm meant for an old +maid, you're meant for an old bachelor--and quite right too!” + +“Oh, it is, is it?” + +“Yes, indeed. You've got no more heart than a mushroom, for you're all +head and legs, and you're going to be just as bald some day.” + +“I am, am I, mistress?” + +“If I were you, Philip, I should hire myself out for a scarecrow, and +then having nothing under your clothes wouldn't so much matter.” + +“It wouldn't, wouldn't it?” said Philip. + +She was shying off at a half circle; he was beating round her. + +“But you're nearly as old as Methuselah already, and what you'll be when +you're a man----” + +“Lookout!” + +She made him an arch curtsey and leapt round a tree, and cried from the +other side, “I know. A squeaking old croaker, with the usual old song, +'Deed yes, friends, this world is a vale of sin and misery.' The men's +the misery and the women's the sin----” + +“You rogue, you!” cried Philip. + +He made after her, and she fled, still speaking, “What do you think a +girl wants with a----Oh! Oh! Oo!” + +Her tirade ended suddenly. She had plunged into a bed of the prickly +gorse, and was feeling in twenty places at once what it was to wear low +shoes and thin stockings. + +“With a Samson, eh?” cried Philip, striding on in his riding breeches, +and lifting the captured creature in his arms. “Why, to carry her, you +torment, to carry her through the gorse like this.” + +“Ah!” she said, turning her face over his shoulder, and tickling his +neck with her breath. + +Her hair caught in a tree, and fell in a dark shower over his breast. He +set her on her feet; they took hands, and went carolling down the glen +together: + +“The brightest jewel in my crown, Wad be my queen, wad be my queen.” + +The daylight lingered as if loth to leave them. There was the fluttering +of wings overhead, and sometimes the last piping of birds. The wind +wandered away, and left their voices sovereign of all the air. + +Then there came a distant shout; the cheer of the farm people on +reaching home with the Melliah.. It awakened Philip as from a fit of +intoxication. + +“This is madness,” he thought. “What am I doing?” “He is going to speak +now,” she told herself. + +Her gaiety shaded off into melancholy, and her melancholy burst into +wild gaiety again. The night had come down, the moon had risen, the +stars had appeared. She crept closer to Philip's side, and began to +tell him the story of a witch. They were near to the house the witch had +lived in. There it was--that roofless cottage--that tholthan under the +deep trees like a dungeon. + +“Have you never heard of her, Philip? No? The one they called the +Deemster's lady?” + +“What Deemster?” said Philip. + +“This one, Deemster Mylrea, who is said to be dying.” + +“He is dying; he is killing himself; I saw him to-day,' said Philip. + +“'Well, she was the blacksmith's daughter, and he left her, and she went +mad and cursed him, and said she was his wife though they hadn't been to +church, and he should never marry anybody else. Then her father turned +her out, and she came up here all alone, and there was a baby, and they +were saying she killed it, and everybody was afraid of her. And all the +time her boy was making himself a great, great man until he got to be +Deemster. But he never married, never, though times and times people +were putting this lady on him and then that; but when they told the +witch, she only laughed and said, 'Let him, he'll get lave enough!' At +last she was old and going on two sticks, and like to die any day, and +then he crept out of his big house unknown to any one and stole up +here to the woman's cottage. And when she saw the old man she said, 'So +you've come at last, boy; but you've been keeping me long, bogh, you've +been keeping me long.' And then she died. Wasn't that strange?” + +Her dark eyes looked up at him and her mouth quivered. + +“Was it witchcraft, then?” said Philip. + +“Oh, no; it was only because he was her husband. That was the hold she +had of him. He was tempted away by a big house and a big name, but he +_had_ to come back to her. And it's the same with a woman. Once a girl +is the wife of somebody, she _must_ cling to him, and if she is ever +false she must return. Something compels her. That's if she's really his +wife--really, truly. How beautiful, isn't it? Isn't it beautiful?” + +“Do you think that, Kate? Do you think a man, like a woman, would cling +the closer?” + +“He couldn't help himself, Philip.” + +Philip tried to say it was only a girl's morality, but her confidence +shamed him. She slipped her moist fingers into his hand again. They were +close by the deserted tholthan, and she was creeping nearer and nearer +to his side. A bat swirled above their heads and she made a faint cry. +Then a cat shot from under a gooseberry bush, and she gave a little +scream. She was breathing irregularly. He could smell the perfume of her +fallen hair. He was in agony of pain and delight. His heart was leaping +in his bosom; his eyes were burning. + +“She's right,” he thought. “Love is best. It is everything. It is the +crown of life. Shall I give it up for the Dead Sea fruit of worldly +success? Think of the Deemster! Wifeless, childless, living solitary, +dying alone, unregretled, unmourned. What is the wickedness you are +plotting? Your father is dead, you can do him neither good nor harm. +This girl is alive. She loves you. Love her. Let the canting hypocrites +prate as they will.” + +She had disengaged her hand, and was creeping away from him in the half +darkness, treading softly and going off like a gleam. + +“Kate!” he called. + +He heard her laughter, he heard the drowsy hum of the gill, he could +smell the warm odour of the gorse bushes. + +“But this is madness,” he thought. “This is the fever of an hour. Yield +now and I am ruined for life. The girl has come between me and my aims, +my vows, my work--everything. She has tempted me, and I am as weak as +water.” + +“Kate!” + +She did not answer. + +“Come here this moment, Kate. I have something to say to you.” + +“Bite!” she said, coming back and holding an apple to his lips. She had +plucked it in the overgrown garden. + +“Listen! I'm leaving Ramsey for good--don't intend to practise in the +northern courts any longer--settling in Douglas--best work lies there, +you see--worst of it is--we shan't meet again soon--not very soon, you +know--not for years, perhaps----” + +He began by stammering, and went on stuttering, blurting out his words, +and trembling at the sound of his own voice. + +“Philip, you must not go!” she cried. “I'm sorry, Kate, very sorry. +Shall always remember so tenderly--not to say fondly--the happy boy and +girl days together.” + +“Philip, Philip, you must not go--you cannot go--you shall not go!” + +He could see her bosom heaving under her loose red bodice. She took hold +of his arm and dragged at it. + +“Won't you spare me? Will you shame me to death? Must I tell you? If you +won't speak, I will. You cannot leave me, Philip, because--because--what +do I care?--because I love you!” + +“Don't say that, Kate!” + +“I love you, Philip--I love you--I love you!” + +“Would to God I had never been born!” + +“But I will show you how sweet it is to be alive. Take me, take me--I am +yours!” + +Her upturned face seemed to flash. He staggered like one seized with +giddiness. It was a thing of terror to behold her. Still he struggled. +“Though apart, we shall remember each other, Kate.” + +“I don't want to remember. I want to have you with me.” + +“Our hearts will always be together.” + +“Come to me then, Philip, come to me!” + +“The purest part of our hearts--our souls----” + +“But I want _you!_ Will you drive a girl to shame herself again? I want +_you_, Philip! I want your eyes that I may see them every day; and +your hair, that I may feel it with my hands; and your lips--can I help +it?--yes, and your lips, that I may kiss and kiss them!” + +“Kate! Kate! Turn your eyes away. Don't look at me like that!” She was +fighting for her life. It was to be now or never. + +“If you won't come to me, I'll go to you!” she cried; and then she +sprang upon him, and all grew confused, the berries of the nightshade +whipped his forehead, and the moon and the stars went out. + +“My love! My darling! My girl!” + +“You won't go now?” she sobbed. + +“God forgive me, I cannot.” + +“Kiss me. I feel your heart beating. You are mine--mine--mine! Say you +won't go now!” + +“God forgive us both!” + +“Kiss me again, Philip! Don't despise me that I love you better than +myself!” + +She was weeping, she was laughing, her heart was throbbing up to her +throat. At the next moment she had broken from his embrace and was gone. + +“Kate! Kate!” + +Her voice came from the tholthan. + +“Philip!” + +When a good woman falls from honour, is it merely that she is a victim +of momentary intoxication, of stress of passion, of the fever of +instinct? No. It is mainly that she is a slave of the sweetest, +tenderest, most spiritual and pathetic of all human fallacies--the +fallacy that by giving herself to the man she loves she attaches him +to herself for ever. This is the real betrayer of nearly all good women +that are betrayed. It lies at the root of tens of thousands of the cases +that make up the merciless story of man's sin and woman's weakness. +Alas! it is only the woman who clings the closer. The impulse of the +man is to draw apart. He must conquer it or she is lost. Such is the +old cruel difference and inequality of man and woman as nature made +them--the old trick, the old tragedy. + + + + +XXIV. + +Old Mannanin, the magician, according to his wont, had surrounded +his island with mist that day, and, in the helpless void of things +unrevealed, a steamship bound for Liverpool came with engines slacked +some points north of her course, blowing her fog-horn over the +breathless sea with that unearthly yell which must surely be the sound +whereby the devil summons his legions out of chaos. + +Presently something dropping through the dense air settled for a moment +on the damp rope of the companion ladder, and one of the passengers +recognised it. + +“My gough! It's a bird, a sparrow,” he cried. + +At the same moment there was a rustle of wind, the mist lifted, and a +great round shoulder rose through the white gauze, as if it had been the +ghost of a mountain. + +“That's the Isle of Man,” the passenger shouted, and there was a cry +of incredulity. “It's the Calf, I'm telling you, boys. Lave it to me to +know.” And instantly the engines were reversed. + +The passenger, a stalwart fellow, with a look as of pallor under a tawny +tan, walked the deck in a fever of excitement, sometimes shouting in a +cracked voice, sometimes laughing huskily, and at last breaking down in +a hoarse gurgle like a sob. + +“Can't you put me ashore, capt'n?” + +“Sorry I can't, sir, we've lost time already.” + +There was a dog with him, a little, misshappen, ugly creature, and he +lifted it up in his arms and hugged it, and called it by blusterous +swear names, with noises of inarticulate affection. Then he went down +to his berth in the second cabin and opened a little box of letters, and +took them out one by one, and leaned up to the port to read them. He +had read them before, and he knew them by heart, but he traced the lines +with his broad forefinger, and spelled the words one by one. And as he +did so he laughed aloud, and then cried to himself, and then laughed +once more. “She is well and happy, and looking lovely, and, if she does +not write, don't think she is forgetting you.” + +“God bless her. And God bless him, too. God bless them both!” + +He went up on deck again, for he could not rest in one place long. There +was a breeze now, and he filled his lungs and blew and blew. The island +was dying down over the sea in a pale light of silver grey. An engineman +and a stoker were leaning over the bulwark to cool themselves. + +“Happy enough now, sir, eh?” + +“Happy as a sand-boy, mate, only mortal hungry. Tiffin you say? Aw, the +heart has its hunger same as anything else, and mine has been on short +commons these five years and better. See that island there, lying like +a salmon gull atop of the water? Looks as if she might dip under it, +doesn't she? That's my home, my native land, as the man says, and only +three weeks ago I wasn't looking to see the thundering ould thing again; +but God is good, you see, and I am middling fit for all. I'm a Manxman +myself, mate, and I've got a lil Manx woman that's waiting for me +yonder. It's only an ould shirt I'm bringing her to patch, as the saying +is, but she'll be that joyful you never seen. It's bad to take a woman +by surprise, though--these nervous creatures--'sterics, you see--I'll +send her a tally graph from the Stage. My sakes! the joy she'll be +taking of that boy, too! He'll be getting sixpence for himself and +a drink of butter-milk. It's always the way of these poor lil +things--can't stand no good news at all--people coming home and the +like--not much worth, these women--crying reglar--can't help it. Well, +you see, they're tender-hearteder than us, and when anybody's been five +years... Be gough, we're making way, though! The island's going under, +for sure. Or is it my eyes that isn't so clear since my bit of a +bullet-wound! Aw, God is good, tremen-jous!” + +The breaking voice stopped suddenly, and the engine-men turned about, +but the passenger was stumbling down the cabin stairs. + +“If ever a man came back from the dead it's that one,” said both men +together. + + + + +PART III. MAN AND WOMAN + + + + +I. + +Philip was vanquished, and he knew it, but he was not daunted, he was +not distressed. To have resisted the self-abandonment of Kate's love +would have been monstrous. Therefore, he had done no wrong, and there +was nothing to be ashamed of. But when he reached Ballure he did not +dash into Auntie Nan's room, according to his wont, though a light +was burning there, and he could hear the plop and click of thread and +needle; he crept upstairs to his own, and sat down to write a letter. It +was the first of his love letters. + +“I shall count the days, the hours, and the minutes until we meet again, +my darling, and I shall be constantly asking what time it is. And seeing +we must be so much apart, let us contrive a means of being together, +nevertheless. Listen!--I whisper the secret in your ear. To-morrow night +and every night eat your supper at eight o'clock exactly; I will do +the same, and so we shall be supping in each other's company, my little +wife, though twenty miles divide us. If any body asks me to supper, +I will refuse in order that I may sup with you. 'I am promised to a +friend,' I'll say, and then I'll sit down in my rooms alone, but you +will be with me.” + +Tingling with delight, he wrote this letter to Kate, though less than +an hour parted from her, and went out to post it. He was going upstairs +again, steadily, on tiptoe, his head half aside and his face over his +shoulder, when Auntie Nan's voice came from the blue room--“Philip!” + +He returned with a sheepish look, and a sense, never felt before, of +being naked, so to speak. But Auntie Nan did not look at him. She was +working a lamb on a sampler, and she reached over the frame to take +something out of a drawer and hand it to him. It was a medallion of a +young child--a boy, with long fair curls like a girl's, and a face like +sunshine. + +“Was it father, Auntie?” + +“Yes; a French painter who came ashore with Thurlot painted it for +grandfather.” + +Philip laid it on the table. He was more than ever sure that Auntie Nan +had heard something. Such were her tender ways of warning him. He could +not be vexed. + +“I'm sleepy to-night, Auntie, and you look tired too. You've been +waiting up for me again. Now, you really must not. Besides, it limits +one's freedom.” + +“That's nothing, Philip. You said you would come home after calling on +the poor Deemster, and so----” + +“He's in a bad way, Auntie. Drink--delirium--such a wreck. Well, good +night!” + +“Did you read the letters, dear?” + +“Oh, yes. Father's letters. Yes, I read them. Good night.” + +“Aren't they beautiful? Haven't they the very breath of ambition and +enthusiasm? But poor father! How soon the brightness melted away! He +never repined, though. Oh, no, never. Indeed, he used to laugh and joke +at our dreams and our castles in the air. 'You must do it all yourself, +Nannie; you shall have all the cakes and ale.' Yes, when he was a dying +man he would joke like that. But sometimes he would grow serious, and +then he would say, 'Give little Philip some for all. He'll deserve it +more than me. Oh, God,' he would say, 'let me think to myself when I'm +_there_, you've missed the good things of life, but your son has got +them; you are here, but he is on the heights; lie still, thou poor +aspiring heart, lie still in your grave and rest.'” + +Philip felt like a bird struggling in the meshes of a net. + +“My father was a poet, Auntie, trying to be a man of the world. That was +the real mischief in his life, if you think of it.” + +Auntie Nan looked up with her needle at poise above the sampler, and +said in a nervous voice, “The real mischief of your father's life, +Philip, was love--what they call love. But love is not that. Love is +peace and virtue, and right living, and that is only madness and frenzy, +and when people wake up from it they wake up as from a nightmare. Men +talk of it as a holy thing--it is unholy. Books are written in praise of +it--I would have such books burnt. When anybody falls to it, he is like +a blind man who has lost his guide, tottering straight to the precipice. +Women fall to it too. Yes, good women as well as good men; I have seen +them tempted----” + +Philip was certain of it now. Some one had been prying upon him at +Sulby. He was angry, and his anger spent itself on Auntie Nan in a +torrent of words. “You are wrong, Aunt Anne, quite wrong. Love is the +one lovely thing in life. It is beauty, it is poetry. Call it passion if +you will--what would the world be like without it? A place where every +human heart would be an island standing alone; a place without children, +without joy, without merriment, without laughter. No, no; Heaven has +given us love, and we are wrong when we try to put it away. We cannot +put it away, and when we make the attempt we are punished for our pride +and arrogance. It ought to be enough for us to let heaven decide whether +we are to be great men or little men, and to decide for ourselves +whether we are to be good men and happy men. And the greatest happiness +of life is love. Heaven would have to work a miracle to enable us to +live without it. But Heaven does not work such a miracle, because the +greatest miracle of heaven is love itself.” + +The needle hand of Auntie Nan was trembling above her sampler, and her +lips were twitching. + +“You are a young man yet, Philip,” she faltered, “but I am an old lady +now, dear, and I have seen the fruits of the intoxication you call +passion. Oh, have I not, have I not? It wrecks lives, ruins prospects, +breaks up homes, sets father against son, and brother against +brother----” + +Philip would give her no chance. He was tramping across the room, and +he burst out with, “You are wrong again, Auntie. You are always wrong +in these matters, because you are always thinking from the particular +to the general--you are always thinking of my father. What you have been +calling my father's fall was really his fate. He deserved it. If he had +been fit for the high destiny he aspired to--if he had been fit to be a +judge, he would not have fallen. That he did fall is proof enough that +he was not fit. God did not intend it. My father's aspirations were not +the call of a stern vocation, they were mere poetic ambition. If he had +ever by great ill-fortune lived to be made Deemster, he would have found +himself out, and the island would have found him out, and you yourself +would have found him out, and all the world would have been undeceived. +As a poet he might have been a great man, but as a Deemster he must have +been a mockery, a hypocrite, an impostor, and a sham.” + +Auntie Nan rose to her feet with a look of fright on her sweet old face, +and something dropped with a clank on to the floor. + +“Oh, Philip, Philip, if I thought you could ever repeat the error----” + +But Philip gave her no time to finish. Tossing his disordered hair from +his forehead, he swung out of the room. + +Being alone, he began to collect himself. Was it, in sober fact, he who +had spoken like that? Of his father too? To Auntie Nan as well? He saw +how it was; he had been speaking of his father, but he had been thinking +of himself; he had been struggling to justify himself, to reconcile, +strengthen, and fortify himself. But in doing so he had been breaking an +idol, a life-long idol, his own idol and Auntie Nan's. + +He stumbled downstairs in a rush of remorse, and burst again into the +room crying in a broken voice, “Auntie! Auntie!” + +But the room was empty; the lamp was turned down; the sampler was pushed +aside. Something crunched under his foot, and he stooped and picked +it up. It was the medallion, and it was cracked across. The accident +terrified him. His skin seemed to creep. He felt as if he had trodden on +his father's face. Putting the broken picture into his pocket, he turned +about like a guilty man and crept silently to bed in the darkness. + +But the morning brought him solace for the pains of the night--it +brought him a letter from Kate. + +“The Melliah is over at long, long last, and I am allowed to be alone +with my thoughts. They sang 'Keerie fu Snaighty' after you left, and +'The King can only love his wife, And I can do the sa-a-me, And I can do +the same.' But there is really nothing to tell you, for nothing happened +of the slightest consequence. Good night! I am going to bed after I have +posted this letter at the bridge. Two hours hence you will appear to me +in sleep, unless I lie that long awake to think of you. I generally do. +Good-bye, my dear lord and master! You will let me know what you think +best to be done. Your difficulties alarm me terribly. You see, dear, we +two are about to do something so much out of the common. Good night! I +lift my head that you may give me another kiss on the eyes, and here are +two for yours.” + +Then there were empty brackets [ ], which Kate had put her lips to, +expecting Philip to do the same. + + + + +II. + +Philip was going into his chambers in Douglas that morning when he came +upon a messenger from Government House in stately intercourse with his +servant. His Excellency begged him to step up to Onchan immediately, and +to remain for lunch. + +The Governor's carriage was at the door, and Philip got into it. He +was not excited; he remembered his agitation at the Governor's former +message and smiled. On leaving his own rooms he had not forgotten to +order supper for eight o'clock precisely. + +He found the Governor polite and expansive as usual. He was sitting in +a room hung round with ponderous portraits of former Governors, most of +them in frills and ruffles, and one vast picture of King George. + +“You will have heard,” he said, “that our northern Deemster is dead.” + +“Is he so?” said Philip. “I saw him at one o'clock yesterday.” + +“He died at two?” said the Governor. + +“Poor man, poor man!” said Philip. + +That was all. Not a tremble of the eyelid, not a quiver of the lip. + +“You are aware that the office is a Crown appointment?” said the +Governor. “Applications are made, you know, to the Home Office, but +it is probable that my advice may be asked by the Secretary in his +selection. I may, perhaps, be of use to a candidate.” + +Philip gave no sign, and the Governor shifted his leg and continued with +a smile, “Certainly that appears to be the impression of your brother +advocates, Mr. Christian; they are about me already, like wasps at a +glue-pot. I will not question but you'll soon be one of them.” + +Philip made a gesture of protestation, and the Governor waved his hand +and smiled again. “Oh, I shan't blame you; young men are ambitious. It +is natural that they should wish to advance themselves in life. In your +case, too, if I may say so, there is the further spur of a desire to +recover the position your family once held, and lately lost through the +mistake or misfortune of your father.” + +Philip bowed gravely, but said nothing. + +“That, no doubt,” said the Governor, “would be a fact in your favour. +The great fact against you would be that you are still so young. Let me +see, is it eight-and twenty?” + +“Twenty-six,” said Philip. + +“No more? Only six-and-twenty? And then, successful as your career has +been thus far--perhaps I should say distinguished or even brilliant--you +are still unsettled in life.” + +Philip asked if his Excellency meant that he was still unmarried. + +“And if I do,” the Governor replied, with pretended severity, “and if I +do, don't smile too broadly, young man. You ought to know by this time +that the personal equation counts for something in this old-fashioned +island of yours. Now, the late Deemster was an example which it would +be perilous to repeat. If it were repeated, I know who would hear of +the blunder every day of his life, and it wouldn't be the Home Secretary +either. Deemster Mylrea was called upon to punish the crimes of drink, +and he was himself a drunkard; to try the offences of sensuality, and he +was himself a sensualist.” + +Philip could not help it--he gave a little crack of laughter. + +“To be sure,” said the Governor hastily, “you are in no danger of his +excesses; but you will not be a safe candidate to recommend until +you have placed yourself to all appearances out of the reach of them. +'Beware of these Christians,' said the great Derby to his son; and +pardon me if I revive the warning to a Christian himself.” + +The colour came strong into Philip's face. Even at that moment he felt +angry at so coarse a version of his father's fault. + +“You mean,” said he, “that we are apt to marry unwisely.” + +“I do that,” said the Governor. + +“There's no telling,” said Philip, with a faint crack of his fingers; +and the Governor frowned a little--the pock-marks seemed to spread. + +“Of course, all this is outside my duty, Mr. Christian--I needn't tell +you that; but I feel an interest in you, and I've done you some services +already, though naturally a young man will think he has done everything +for himself. Ah!” he said, rising from his seat at the sound of a gong, +“luncheon is ready. Let us join the ladies.” Then, with one hand on +Philip's shoulder familiarly, “only a word more, Mr. Christian. Send +in your application immediately, and--take the advice of an old +fiddler--marry as soon afterwards as may be. But with your prospects +it would be a sin not to walk carefully. If she's English, so much the +better; but if she's Manx--take care.” + +Philip lunched with the Governor's wife, who told him she remembered his +grandfather; also with his unmarried daughter, who said she had heard +him speak for the fishermen at Peel. An official “At home,” the last of +the summer, was to be held in the garden that afternoon, and Philip was +invited to remain. He did so, and thereby witnessed the assaults of the +wasps at the glue-pot. They buzzed about the Governor, they buzzed about +his wife, they buzzed about his dog and about a tame deer, which took +grapes from the hands of the guests. + +An elderly gentleman, sitting alone in a carriage, drove up to the lawn. +It was Peter Christian Ballawhaine, looking feebler, whiter, and more +splay-footed than before. Philip stepped up to his uncle and offered +his arm to alight by. But the Ballawhaine brushed it aside and pushed +through to the Governor, to whom he talked incessantly for some minutes +of his son Ross, saying he had sent for him and would like to present +him to his Excellency. + +If Philip lacked enjoyment of the scene, if his face lacked heart and +happiness, it was not the fault of his host. “Will you not take Lady +So-and-so to have tea?” the Governor would say; and presently Philip +found himself in a circle of official wifedom, whose husbands had been +made Knights by the Queen, and themselves made Ladies by--God knows +whom. The talk was of the late Deemster. + +“Such a life! It's a mercy he lasted so long!” + +“A pity, you mean, my dear, not to be hard on him either.” + +“Poor thing! He ought to have married. Such a man wants a wife to look +after him. Don't you think so, Mr. Christian?” + +“Why,” said a white-haired dame, “have you never heard of his great +romance?” + +“Ah! tell us of that. Who was the lady?” + +“The lady----” there was a pause; the white-haired dame coughed, smiled, +closed her little ferret eyes, dropped her voice, and said with mock +gravity, “The lady was the blacksmith's daughter, dearest.” And then +there was a merry trill of laughter. + +Philip felt sick, bowed to his hosts, and left. As he was going off, his +uncle intercepted him, holding out both hands. + +“How's this, Philip? You never come to Ballawhaine now. I see! Oh, I +see! Too busy with the women to remember an old man. They're all talking +of you. Putting the comather on them, eh? I know, I know; don't tell +me.” + + + + +III. + +Philip's way home lay through the town, but he made a circuit of the +country, across Onchan, so heartsick was he, so utterly choked with +bitter feelings. He felt as if all the angels and devils together must +be making a mock at him. The thing he had worked for through five heavy +years, the end he had aimed at, the goal he had fought for, was his +already--his for the stretching out of his hand. Yet now that it was +his, he could not have it. Oh, the mockery of his fate! Oh, the irony of +his life! It was shrieking, it was frantic! + +Then his bolder spirit seemed to say, “What is all this childish fuming +about? Fortune comes to you with both hands full. Be bold, and you may +have both the wish of your soul and the desire of your heart--both the +Deemster-ship and Kate.” + +It was impossible to believe that. If he married Kate, the Governor +would not recommend him as Deemster. Had he not admitted that he +stood in some fear of the public opinion of the island? And was it not +conceivable that, besides the unselfish interest which the Governor +had shown in him, there was even a personal one that would operate more +powerfully than fear of the old-fashioned Manx conventions to prevent +any recommendation of the husband of the wrong woman? At one moment a +vague memory rose before Philip, as he crossed the fields, of the lunch +at Government House, of the Governor's wife and daughter, of their +courtesy and boundless graciousness. At the next moment he had drawn up +sharply, with pangs of self-contempt, hating himself, loathing himself, +swearing at himself for a mean-souled ingrate, as he kicked up the grass +and the turf beneath it But the idea had taken root. He could not help +it; the Governor's interest went for nothing in his reckoning. + +“What a fool you are, Philip,” something seemed to whisper out of the +darkest corner of his conscience; “take the Deemstership first, and +marry Kate afterwards.” But it was impossible to think of that either. +Say it could be done by any arts of cunning or duplicity, what then? +Then there were the high walls of custom and prejudice to surmount. +Philip remembered the garden-party, and saw that they could never be +surmounted. The Deemster who slapped the conventions in the face would +suffer for it. He would be taboo to half the life of the island--in +public an official, in private a recluse. An icy picture rose before his +mind's eye of the woman who would be his wife in her relations with +the ladies he had just left. She might be their superior in education, +certainly in all true manners, and in natural grace and beauty, in +sweetness and charm, their mistress beyond a dream of comparison. +But they would never forget that she was the daughter of a country +innkeeper, and every little cobble in the rickety pyramid, even from the +daughter of the innkeeper in the town, would look down on her as from a +throne. + +He could see them leaving their cards at his door and driving hurriedly +off. They must do that much. It was the bitter pill which the Deemster's +doings made them swallow. Then he could see his wife sitting alone, a +miserable woman, despised envied, isolated, shut off from her own class +by her marriage with the Deemster, and from his class by the Deemster's +marriage with her. Again, he could see himself too powerful to offend, +too dangerous to ignore, going out on his duties without cheer, and +returning to his wife without company. Finally, he remembered his father +and his mother, and he could not help but picture himself sitting at +home with Kate five years after their marriage, when the first happiness +of each other's society had faded, had staled, had turned to the +wretchedness of starvation in its state of siege. Or perhaps going out +for walks with her, just themselves, always themselves only, they two +together, this evening, last evening, and to-morrow evening; through +the streets crowded by visitors, down the harbour where the fishermen +congregate, across the bridge and over the head between sea and sky; +people bowing to them respectfully, rigidly, freezingly; people nudging +and whispering and looking their way. Oh, God, what end could come of +such an abject life but that, beginning by being unhappy, they should +descend to being bad as well? + +“What a fuss you are making of things,” said the voice again, but more +loudly. “This hubbub only means that you can't have your cake and eat +it. Very well, take Kate, and let the Deemstership go to perdition.” + +There was not much comfort in that counsel, for it made no reckoning +with the certainty that, if marriage with Kate would prevent him from +being Deemster, it would prevent him from being anything in the Isle +of Man. As it had happened with his father, so it would happen with +him--there would be no standing ground in the island for the man who had +deliberately put himself outside the pale. + +“Don't worry me with silly efforts to draw a line so straight. If you +can't have Kate and the Deemstership together, and if you can't have +Kate without the Deemstership, there is only one thing left--the +Deemstership without Kate. You must take the office and forego the girl. +It is your duty, your necessity.” + +This was how Philip put it to himself at length, and the daylight had +gone by that time, and he was walking in the dark. But the voice which +had been pleading on his side now protested on hers. + +“Don't prate of duty and necessity. You mean self-love and +self-interest. Man, be honest. Because this woman is an obstacle in your +career, you would sacrifice her. It is boundless, pitiless selfishness. +Suppose you abandon her, dare you think of her without shame! She loves +you, she trusts you, and she has given you proof of her love and trust. +Hold your tongue. Don't dare to whisper that nobody knows it but you +and heir--that you will be silent, that she will have no temptation to +speak. She loves you. She has given you all. God bless her!” + +Affectionate pity swept down the selfish man in him. As the lights of +the town appeared on his path, he was saying to himself boldly, “Since +either way there is trouble, I'll do as I said last night--I'll leave +Heaven to decide whether I'm to be a great man or a little man, and +decide for myself whether I'm to be a true man or a happy man. I'll take +my heart in my hand and go right forward.” + +In this temper he returned to his chambers. The rooms fronted to Athol +Street, but backed on to the churchyard of St. George's. They were +quiet, and not overlooked. His lamp was lit. The servant was laying the +cloth. + +“Lay covers for two, Jemmy,” said Philip. Then he began to hum +something. + +Presently, in feeling for his keys, his fingers touched an unfamiliar +substance in his pocket. He remembered what it was. It was the cracked +medallion of his father. He could not bear to look at it. Unlocking a +chest, he buried it at the bottom under a pile of winter clothing. + +This recalled a possession yet more painful, and going to a desk, he +drew out the packet of his father's letters and proceeded to hide them +away with the medallion. As he did so his hand trembled, his limbs +shook, he felt giddy, and he thought the voice that had tormented him +with conflicting taunts was ringing in his ears again. “Bury him deep! +Bury your father out of all sight and all remembrance. Bury his love +of you, his hopes of you, his expectations and dreams of you. Bury and +forget him for ever.” + +Philip hesitated a moment, and then banged down the lid of the chest, +and relocked it as his servant returned to the room. The man was a +solemn, dignified, and reticent person, who had been groom to the late +Bishop. His gravity he had acquired from his horses, his dignity from +his master; but his reticence he had created for himself, being a thing +beyond nature in creature or man. His proper name was Cottier; he had +always been known as Jemy-Lord. + +“Company not arrived, sir,” he said. “Wait or serve?” + +“What is the time?” said Philip. + +“Struck eight; but clock two minutes soon.” + +“Serve the supper at once,” said Philip. + +When the dishes had been brought in and the man dismissed, Philip, +taking his place at the table, drew from his button-hole a flower which +he had picked out of his water-bowl at lunch, and, first putting it to +his lips, he tossed it on to the empty place before the chair which had +been drawn up opposite. Then he sat down to eat. + +He ate little; and, do what he would, he could not keep his mind +from wandering. He thought of his aunt, and how hurt she had been the +previous night; of his uncle, and how he had snubbed and then slavered +over him; of the Governor, and how strange the interest he had shown in +him; and finally, he thought of Pete, and how lately he was dead, and +how soon forgotten. + +In the midst of these memories, all sad and some bitter, suddenly he +remembered again that he was supping with Kate. Then he struggled to +be bright and even a little gay. He knew that she would be taking her +supper at Sulby at that moment, thinking of him and making believe that +he was with her. So he tried to think that she was with him, sitting in +the chair opposite, looking across the table between the white cloth +and the blue lamp-shade, out of her beaming eyes, with her rings of dark +hair dancing on her forehead, and her ripe mouth twitching merrily. Then +the air of the room seemed to be filled with a sweet presence. He +could have fancied there was a perfume of lace and dainty things. +“Sweetheart!” He laughed--he hardly knew if it was himself that had +spoken. It was dear, delicious fooling. + +But his eyes fell on the chest wherein he had buried the letters and the +medallion, and his mind wandered again. He thought of his father, of his +grandfather, of his lost inheritance, and how nearly he had reclaimed +the better part of it, and then once more of Pete, crying aloud at last +in the coil of his trouble, “Oh, if Pete had only lived!” + +His voice startled and his words horrified him. To wipe out both in +the first moment of recovered consciousness, he filled his glass to +the brim, and lifted it up, rising at the same time, looking across +the table, and saying in a soft whisper, “Your health, darling, your +health!” + +The bell rang from the street door, and he stood listening with the +wine-glass in his hand. When he knew anything more, a voice at his +elbow was saying out of a palpitating gloom, “The gentleman can't come, +seemingly; he has sent a telegram.” + +It was Jem-y-Lord holding a telegram in his hand. + +Philip tore open the envelope and read-- + +“Coming home by Ramsey boat to-morrow well and hearty tell Kirry Peat.” + + + + +IV. + +Somewhere in the dead and vacant dawn Philip went to bed, worn out by a +night-long perambulation of the dark streets. He slept a heavy sleep +of four deep hours, with oppressive dreams of common things swelling to +enormous size about him. + +When Jem-y-Lord took the tea to his master's bedroom in the morning, +the tray was almost banged out of his hands by the clashing back of the +door, after he had pushed it open with his knee. The window was half +up, and a cold sea-breeze was blowing into the room; yet the grate and +hearth showed that a fire had been kindled in the night, and his master +was still sleeping. + +Jem set down his tray, lifted a decanter that stood on the table, held +it to the light, snorted like an old horse, nodded to himself knowingly, +and closed the window. + +Philip awoke with the noise, and looked around in a bewildered way. He +was feeling vaguely that something had happened, when the man said-- + +“The horse will be round soon, sir.” + +“What horse?” said Philip. + +“The horse you ride, sir,” said Jem, and, with an indulgent smile, he +added, “the one I ordered from Shimmen's when I posted the letter.” + +“What letter?” + +“The letter you gave me to post before I went to bed.” + +All was jumbled and confused in Philip's mind. He was obliged to make an +effort to remember. Just then the newsboys went shouting down the street +beyond the churchyard: “Special edition--Death of the Deemster.” + +Then everything came back. He had written to Kate, asking her to meet +him at Port Mooar at two o'clock that day. It was then, and in that +lonesome place, that he had decided to break the news to her. He must +tell all; he had determined upon his course. + +Without appetite he ate his breakfast. As he did so he heard voices +from a stable-yard in the street. He lifted his head and looked out +mechanically. A four-wheeled dogcart was coming down the archway behind +a mettlesome young horse with silver-mounted harness. The man driving +it was a gorgeous person in a light Melton overcoat. One of his spatted +feet was on the break, and he had a big cigar between his teeth. It was +Ross Christian. + +The last time Philip had seen the man he had fought him for the honour +of Kate. It was like whips and scorpions to think of that now. Ashamed, +abased, degraded in his own eyes, he turned away his head. + + + + +V. + +In the middle of the night following the Melliah, Kate, turning in bed, +kissed her hand because it had held the hand of Philip. When she awoke +in the morning she felt a great happiness. Opening her eyes and half +raising herself in bed, she looked around. There were the pink curtains +hanging like a tent above her, there were the scraas of the thatched +roof, with the cracking whitewash snipping down on the counterpane, +there were the press and the wash-hand table, the sheep-skin on the +floor, and the sun coming through the orchard window. But everything was +transfigured, everything beautiful, everything mysterious. She was like +one who had gone to sleep on the sea, with only the unattainable horizon +round about, and awakened in harbour in a strange land that was warm and +lovely and full of sunshine. She closed her eyes again, so that nothing +might disturb the contemplation of the mystery. She folded her round +arms as a pillow behind her head, her limbs dropped back of their own +weight, and her mouth broke into a happy smile. Oh, miracle of miracles! +The whole world was changed. + +She heard the clatter of pattens in the room below; it was Nancy +churning in the dairy. She heard shouts from beyond the orchard--it was +her father stacking in the haggard; she heard her mother talking in the +bar, and the mill-wheel swishing in the pond. It seemed almost wonderful +that the machinery of ordinary life could be working away the same as +ever. + +Could she be the same herself? She reached over for a hand-glass to look +at her face. As she took it off the table, it slipped from the tips of +her fingers, and, falling face downwards, it broke. She had a momentary +pang at that accident as at a bad omen, but just then Nancy came up with +a letter. It was the letter which Philip had written at Ballure. When +she was alone again she read it. Then she put it in her bosom. It seemed +to be haunted by the odour of the gorse, the odour of the glen, of the +tholthan, of Philip, and of all delights. + +A faint ghost of shame came to frighten her. Had she sinned against her +sex? Was it disgraceful that she had wooed and not waited to be won? +With all his love of her, would Philip be ashamed of her also? Her face +grew hot. She knew that she was blushing, and she covered up her head +as if her lover were there to see. Such fears did not last long. Her joy +was too bold to be afraid of tangible things. So overwhelming was her +happiness that her only fear was lest she might awake at some moment and +find that she was asleep now, and everything had been a dream. + +That was Friday, and towards noon word came from Kirk Michael that the +Deemster had died on the afternoon of the day before. + +“Then they ought to put Philip Christian in his place,” she said +promptly; “I'm sure no one deserves it better.” + +They had been talking in low tones in the kitchen with their backs to +her, but faced about with looks of astonishment. + +“Sakes alive, Kirry,” cried Nancy, “is it yourself it was? What were you +saying a week ago?” + +“Well, do you expect a girl to be saying the one thing always?” laughed +Kate. + +“Aw, no,” said Cæsar. “A woman's opinions isn't usually as stiff as the +tail of a fighting Tom cat. They're more coming and going, of a rule.” + +Next day, Saturday, she received Philip's second letter, the letter +written at Douglas after the supper and the arrival of Pete's +telegram. It was written crosswise, in a hasty hand, on a half-sheet +of note-paper, and was like a postscript, without signature or +superscription:--. + +“Most urgent. Must see you immediately. Meet me at Port Mooar at two +o'clock to-morrow. We can talk there without interruption. Be brave, my +dear. There are serious matters to discuss and arrange.” + +The message was curt, and even cold, but it brought her no disquiet. +Marriage! That was the only vision it conjured up. The death of the +Deemster had hastened things--that was the meaning of the urgency. Port +Mooar was near to Ballure--that was why she had to go so far. They would +have to face gossip, perhaps backbiting, perhaps even abuse--that was +the reason she had to be brave. Why and how the Deemster's death should +affect her marriage with Philip was a matter she did not puzzle out. +She had vague memories of girls marrying in delightful haste and sailing +away with their husbands, and being gone before you had time to think +they were to go. But this new fact of her life was only a part of +the great mystery, and was not to be explained by everyday ideas and +occurrences. + +Kate ran up to dress, and came down like a bud bursting into flower. She +had dressed more carefully than ever. Philip had great expectations; he +must not be disappointed. Making the excuse of shopping, she was setting +off towards Ramsey, when her father shouted from the stable that he was +for driving the same way. The mare was harnessed to the gig, and they +got up together. + +Cæsar had made inquiries and calculations. He had learned that the +_Johannesburg_, from Cape Town, arrived in Liverpool the day before; and +he concluded that Pete's effects would come by the _Peveril_, the weekly +steamer to Ramsay, on Saturday morning, The _Peveril_ left Liverpool at +eight; she would be due at three. Cæsar meant to be on the quay at two. + +“It's my duty as a parent, Kate,” said he. “What more natural but +there's something for yourself? It's my duty as a pastor, too, for +there's Manx ones going that's in danger of the devil of covetousness, +and it's doing the Lord's work to put them out of the reach of +temptation. You may exhort with them till you're black in the face, but +it's throwing good money in the mud. Just _chuck!_ No ring at all; no +way responsive!” + +Kate was silent, and Cæsar added familiarly, “Of course, it's my right +too, for when a man's birth is _that_ way, there's no heirship by blood, +and possession is nine points of the law. That's so, Kate. You needn't +be looking so hard. It's truth enough, girl. I've had advocate's +opinion.” + +Kate had looked, but had not listened. The matter of her father's talk +was too trivial, it's interest was too remote. As they drove, she kept +glancing seaward and asking what time it was. + +“Aw, time enough yet, woman,” said Cæsar. “No need to be unaisy at all. +She'll not be round the Head for an hour anyway. Will you come along +with me to the quay, then? No? Well, better not, maybe.” + +At the door of a draper's she got down from the gig, and told her father +not to wait for her on going home. Cæsar moistened his forefinger and +held it in the air a moment. + +“Then don't be late,” said he, “there's weather coming.” + +A few minutes afterwards she was walking rapidly up Ballure. Passing +Ballure House, she found herself treading softly. It was like holy +ground. She did not look across; she gave no sign; there was only a +tremor of the eyelids, a quiver of the mouth, and a tightening of the +hand that held her purse, as, with head down, she passed on. Going by +the water-trough, she saw the bullet-head of Black Tom looking seaward +over the hedge through a telescope encased in torn and faded cloth. +Though the man was repugnant to her, she saluted him cheerfully. + +“Fine day, Mr. Quilliam.” + +“It _was_ doing a fine day, ma'am, but the bees is coming home,” said +Tom. + +He glowered at her as at a scout of the enemy, but she did not mind +that. She was very happy. The sun was still shining. On reaching the +top of the brow, she began to skip and run where the road descends by +Folieu. Thus, with a light heart and a light step, thinking ill of no +one, in love with all the world, she went hurrying to her doom. + +The sea below lay very calm and blue. Nothing was to be seen on the +water but a line of black smoke from the funnel of a steamship which had +not yet risen above the horizon. + + + + +VI. + +Philip put up his horse at the Hibernian, a mile farther on the +high-road, and the tongue of the landlady, Mistress Looney went like +a mill-race while he ate his dinner. She had known three generations of +his family, and was full of stories of his grandfather, of his father, +and of himself in his childhood. Full of facetiæ, too, about his looks, +which were “rasonable promising,” and about the girls of Douglas, who +were “neither good nor middling.” She was also full of sage counsel, +advising marriage with a warm girl having “nice things at her--nice +lands and pigs and things”--as a ready way to square the “bobbery” of +thirty years ago at Ballawhaine. + +Philip left his plate half full, and rose from the table to go down to +Port Mooar. + +“But, boy veen, you've destroyed nothing,”, cried the landlady. And then +coaxingly, as if he had been a child, “You'll be ateing bits for me, +now, come, come! No more at all? Aw, it's failing you are, Mr. Philip! +Going for a walk is it? Take your topcoat then, for the clover is +closing.” + +He took the road that Pete had haunted as a boy on returning home from +school in the days when Kate lived at Cornaa, going through the network +of paths by the mill, and over the brow by Ballajora. The new miller was +pulling down the thatched cottage in which Kate had been born to put +up a slate house. They had built a porch for shelter to the chapel, and +carved the figure of a slaughtered lamb on a stone in the gable. Another +lamb--a living lamb--was being killed by the butcher of Ballajora as +Philip went by the shambles. The helpless creature, with its inverted +head swung downwards from the block, looked at him with its piteous +eyes, and gave forth that distressful cry which is the last wild appeal +of the stricken animal when it sees death near, and has ceased to fight +for life. + +The air was quiet, and the sea was calm, but across the Channel a +leaden sky seemed to hover over the English mountains, though they were +still light and apparently in sunshine. As Philip reached Port Mooar, a +cart was coming out of it with a load of sea-wrack for the land, and a +lobster-fisher on the beach was shipping his gear for sea. + +“Quiet day,” said Philip in passing. + +“I'm not much liking the look of it, though,” said the fisherman. +“Mortal thick surf coming up for the wind that's in.” But he slipped his +boat, pulled up sail, and rode away. + +Philip looked at his watch and then walked down the beach. Coming to a +cave, he entered it. The sea-wrack was banked up in the darkness behind, +and between two stones at the mouth there were the remains of a recent +fire. Suddenly he remembered the cave. It was the cave of the Carasdhoo +men. He éould hear the voice of Pete in its rumbling depths; he could +hear and see himself. “Shall we save the women, Pete?--we always do.” + “Aw, yes, the women--and the boys.” The tenderness of that memory was +too much for Philip. He came out of the cave, and walked back over the +shore. + +“She will come by the church,” he thought, and he climbed the cliffs +to look out. A line of fir-trees grew there, a comb of little misshapen +ghoul-like things, stunted by the winds that swept over the seas in +winter. In a fork of one of these a bird's nest of last year was still +hanging; but it was now empty, songless, joyless, and dead. + +“She's here.” he told himself, and he drew his breath noisily. A white +figure had turned the road by the sundial, and was coming on with the +step of a greyhound. + +The black clouds above the English mountains were heeling down on the +land. There was a storm on the other coast, though the sky over the +island was still fine. The steamship had risen above the horizon, and +was heading towards the bay. + + + + +VII. + +She met him on the hill slope with a cry of joy, and kissed him. It came +into his mind to draw away, but he could not, and he kissed her back. +Then she linked her arm in his, and they turned down the beach. + +“I'm glad you've come,” he began. + +“Did you ever dream I wouldn't?” she said. Her face was a smile, her +voice was an eager whisper. + +“I have something to say to you, Kate--it is something serious.” + +“Is it so?” she said. “So very serious?” + +She was laughing and blushing together. Didn't she know what he was +going to say? Didn't she guess what this serious something must be? To +prolong the delicious suspense before hearing it, she pretended to be +absorbed in the things about her. She looked aside at the sea, and up +at the banks, and down at the little dubbs of salt water as she skipped +across them, crying out at sight of the sea-holly, the anemone, and +the sea-mouse shining like fire, but still holding to Philip's arm and +bounding and throbbing on it. + +“You must be quiet, dear, and listen,” he said. + +“Oh, I'll be good--so very good,” she said. “But look! only look at the +white horses out yonder--far out beyond the steamer. Davy's putting on +the coppers for the parson, eh?” + +She caught the grave expression of Philip's face, and drew herself up +with pretended severity, saying, “Be quiet, Katey. Behave yourself. +Philip wants to talk to you--seriously--very seriously.” + +Then, leaning forward with head aside to look up into his face, she +said, “Well, sir, why don't you begin? Perhaps you think I'll cry out. I +won't--I promise you I won't.” + +But she grew uneasy at the settled gravity of his face, and the joy +gradually died off her own. When Philip spoke, his voice was like a +cracked echo of itself. + +“You remember what you said, Kate, when I brought you that last letter +from Kimberley--that if next morning you found it was a mistake------” + +“_Is_ it a mistake?” she asked. + +“Becalm, Kate.” + +“I am quite calm, dear. I remember I said it would kill me. But I was +very foolish. I should not say so now. Is Pete alive?” + +She spoke without a tremor, and he answered in a husky whisper, “Yes.” + +Then, in a breaking voice, he said, “We were very foolish Kate--jumping +so hastily to a conclusion was very foolish-it was worse than foolish, +it was wicked. I half doubted the letter at the time, but, God forgive +me, I _wanted_ to believe it, and so----” + +“I am glad Pete is living,” she said quietly. + +He was aghast at her calmness. The irregular lines in his face showed +the disordered state of his soul, but she walked by his side without +the quiver of an eyelid, or a tinge of colour more than usual. Had she +understood? + +“Look!” he said, and he drew Pete's telegram from his pocket and gave it +to her. + +She opened it easily, and he watched her while she read it, prepared for +a cry, and ready to put his arms about her if she fell. But there was +not a movement save the motion of her fingers, not a sound except +the crinking of the thin paper. He turned his head away. The sun was +shining; there was a steely light on the firs, and here and there a +white breaker was rising like a sea-bird out of the blue surface of the +sea. + +“Well?” she said. + +“Kate, you astonish me,” said Philip. “This comes on us like a +thundercloud, and you seem not to realise it.” + +She put her arms about his neck, and the paper rustled on his shoulder. +“My darling,” she said, “do you love me still?” + +“You know I love you, but----” + +“Then there is no thundercloud in heaven for me now,” she said. + +The simple grandeur of the girl's love shamed him. Its trust, its +confidence, its indifference to all the evil chance of life if only he +loved her still, this had been beyond him. But he disengaged her arms +and said, “We must not live in a fool's paradise, Kate. You promised +yourself to Pete----” + +“But, Philip,” she said, “that was when I was a child. It was only a +half promise then, and I didn't know what I was doing. I didn't know +what love was. All that came later, dearest, much later--you know when.” + +“To Pete it is the same thing, Kate,” said Philip. “He is coming home to +claim you----” + +She stopped him by getting in front of him and saying, with face down, +smoothing his sleeve as she spoke, “You are a man, Philip, and you +cannot understand. How can you, and how can I tell you? When a girl is +not a woman, but only a child, she is a different person. She can't love +anybody then--not really--not to say love, and the promises she makes +can't count. It was not I that promised myself to Pete--if I did +promise. It was my little sister--the little sister that was me long, +long ago, but is now gone--put to sleep inside me somewhere. Is that +_very_ foolish, darling?” + +“But think of Pete,” said Philip; “think of him going away for love of +you, living five years abroad, toiling, slaving, saving, encountering +privations, perhaps perils, and all for you, all for love of you. Then +think of him coming home with his heart full of you, buoyed up with the +hope of you, thirsting, starving, and yearning for you, and finding you +lost to him, dead to him, worse than dead--it will kill him, Kate.” + +She was unmoved by the picture. “I am very sorry, but I do not love +him,” she said quietly. “I am sorry--what else can a girl be when she +does not love a young man?” + +“He left me to take care of you, too, and you see--you see by the +telegram--he is coming home with faith in my loyalty. How can I tell him +that I have broken my trust? How can I meet him and explain----” + +“I know, Philip. Say we heard he was dead and----” + +“No, it would be too wretched. It's only three weeks since the letter +came--and it would not be true, Kate--it would revolt me.” + +She lifted her eyes in a fond look of shame-faced love, and said again, +“_I_ know, then--lay the blame on me, Philip. What do I care? Say it +was all my fault, and I made you love me. _I_ shan't care for anybody's +talk. And it's true, isn't it? Partly true, eh?” + +“If I talked to Pete of temptation I should despise myself,” said +Philip; and then she threw her head up and said proudly-- + +“Very well, tell the truth itself--the simple truth, Philip. Say we +tried to be faithful and loyal, and all that, and could not, because we +loved each other, and there was no help for it.” + +“If I tell him the truth, I shall die of shame,” said Philip. “Oh, there +is no way out of this miserable tangle. Whether I cover myself with +deceit, or strip myself of evasion, I shall stain my soul for ever. I +shall become a base man, and year by year sink lower and lower in the +mire of lies and deceit.” + +She listened with her eyes fixed on his quivering face, and her eyelids +fluttered, and her fond looks began to be afraid. + +“Say that we married,” he continued; “we should never forget that you +had broken your promise and I my trust. That memory would haunt us as +long as we lived. We should never know one moment's happiness or one +moment's peace. Pete would be a broken-hearted man, perhaps a wreck, +perhaps--who knows?--dead of his own hand. He would be the ghost between +us always.” + +“And do you think I should be afraid of that?” she said. “Indeed, no. If +you were with me, Philip, and loved me still, I should not care for all +the spirits of heaven itself.” + +Her face was as pale as death now, but her great eyes were shining. + +“Our love would fail us, Kate,” said Philip. “The sense of our guilt +would kill it. How could we go on loving each other with a thing like +that about us all day and all night--sitting at our table--listening to +our talk--standing by our bed? Oh, merciful God!” + +The terror of his vision mastered him, and he covered his face with both +hands. She drew them down again and held them in a tight lock in her +fingers. But the stony light of his eyes was more fearful to look +upon, and she said in a troubled voice, “Do you mean, Philip, that +we--could--not marry--now?” + +He did not answer, and she repeated the question, looking up into his +face like a criminal waiting for his sentence--her head bent forward and +her mouth open. + +“We cannot,” he muttered. “God help us, we dare not,” he said; and then +he tried to show her again how their marriage was impossible, now that +Pete had come, without treason and shame and misery. But his words +frayed off into silence. He caught the look of her eyes, and it was like +the piteous look of the lamb under the hands of the butcher. + +“Is that what you came to tell me?” she asked. + +His reply died in his throat. She divined rather than heard it. + +Her doom had fallen on her, but she did not cry out. She did not yet +realise in all its fulness what had happened. It was like a bullet-wound +in battle; first a sense of air, almost of relief, then a pang, and then +overwhelming agony. + +They had been walking again, but she slid in front of him as she had +done before. Her arms crept up his breast with a caressing touch, and +linked themselves behind his neck. + +“This is only a jest, dearest,” she said, “some test of my love, +perhaps. You wished to make sure of me--quite, quite sure--now that Pete +is alive and coming home. But, you see, I want only one to love me, +only one, dear. Come, now, confess. Don't be afraid to say you have been +playing with me. I shan't be angry with you. Come, speak to me.” + +He could not utter a word, and she let her arms fall from his neck; +and they walked on side by side, both staring out to sea. The English +mountains were black by this time. A tempest was raging on the other +shore, though the air on this side was as soft as human breath. . + +Presently she stopped, her feet scraped the gravel, and she exclaimed +in a husky tone, “I know what it is. It is not Pete. I am in your way. +That's it. You can't get on with me about you. I am not fit for you. The +distance between us is too great.” + +He struggled to deny it, but he could not. It was part of the truth. He +knew too well how near to being the whole truth it was. Pete had come +at the last moment to cover up his conscience, but Kate was stripping it +naked and showing him the skeleton. + +“It's all very well for you,” she cried, “but where am I? Why didn't +you leave me alone? Why did you encourage me? Yes, indeed, encourage +me! Didn't you say, though a woman couldn't raise herself in life, a man +could lift her up if he only loved her? And didn't you tell me there was +neither below nor above where there was true liking, and that if a woman +belonged to some one, and some one belonged to her, it was God's sign +that they were equal, and everything else was nothing--pride was nothing +and position was nothing and the whole world was nothing? But now I know +different. The world is between us. It always has been between us, and +you can never belong to me. You will go on and rise up, and I will be +left behind.” + +Then she broke into frightful laughter. “Oh, I have been a fool! How I +dreamt of being happy! I knew I was only a poor ignorant thing, but I +saw myself lifted up by the one I loved. And now I am to be left alone. +Oh, it is awful! Why did you deceive me? Yes, deceive me! Isn't that +deceiving me? You deceived me when you led me to think that you loved +me more than all the world. You don't I It is the world itself you love, +and Pete is only your excuse.” + +As she spoke she clutched at his arms, his hands, his breast, and at her +own throat, as if something was strangling her. He did not answer her +reproaches, for he knew well what they were. They were the bitter cry +of her great love, her great misery, and her great jealousy of the +world--the merciless and mysterious power that was luring him away. +After awhile his silence touched her, and she came up to him, full +of remorse, and said, “No, no, Philip, you have nothing to reproach +yourself with. You did not deceive me at all. I deceived myself. It was +my own fault. I led you on--I know that. And yet I've been saying these +cruel things. You'll forgive me, though, will you not? A girl can't help +it sometimes, Philip. Are you crying? You are not crying, are you? Kiss +me, Philip, and forgive me. You can do that, can't you?” + +She asked like a child, with her face up and her lips apart. He was +about to yield, and was reaching forward to touch her forehead, when +suddenly the child became the woman, and she leapt upon his breast, +and held him fervently, her blood surging, her bosom exulting, her eyes +flaming, and her passionate voice crying, “Philip, you are mine. No, I +will not release you. I don't care about your plans--you shall give +them up. I don't care about your trust--you shall break it. I don't care +about Pete coming--let him come. The world can do without you--I cannot. +You are mine, Philip, and I am yours, and nobody else's, and never will +be. You _must_ come back to me, sooner or later, if you go away. I know +it, I feel it, it's in my heart. But I'll never let you go. I can't, +I can't. Haven't I a right to you? Yes, I have a right. Don't you +remember?... Can you ever forget?... My _husband!_” + +The last word came muffled from his breast, where she had buried her +head in the convulsions of her trembling at the moment when her modesty +went down in the fierce battle with a higher pain. But the plea which +seemed to give her the right to cling the closer made the man to draw +apart. It was the old deep tragedy of human love--the ancient inequality +in the bond of man and woman. What she had thought her conquest had +been her vanquishment. He could not help, it--her last word had killed +everything. + +“Oh, God,” he groaned, “that is the worst of all.” + +“Philip,” she cried, “what do you mean?” + +“I mean that neither can I marry you, nor can you marry Pete. You would +carry to him your love of me, and bit by bit he would find it out, and +it would kill him. It would kill you, too, for you have called me your +husband, and you could never, never, never forget it.” + +“I don't want to marry Pete,” she said. “If I'm not to marry you, I +don't want to marry any one. But do you mean that I must not marry at +all--that I never can now that----” + +The word failed her, and his answer came thick and indistinct--“Yes.” + +“And you, Philip? What about yourself?” + +“As there is no other man for you, Kate,” he said, “so there is no other +woman for me. We must go through the world alone.” + +“Is this my punishment?” + +“It is the punishment of both, Kate, the punishment of both alike.” + +Kate stopped her breathing. Her clenched hands slackened away from +his neck, and she stepped back from him, shuddering with remorse, and +despair, and shame. She saw herself now for the first time a fallen +woman. Never before had her sin touched her soul. It was at that moment +she fell. + +They had come up to the cave by this time, and she sat on the stone at +the mouth of it in a great outburst of weeping. It tore his heart to +hear her. The voice of her weeping was like the distressful cry of the +slaughtered lamb. He had to wrestle with himself not to take her in his +arms and comfort her. The fit of tears spent itself at length, and after +a time she drew a great breath and was quiet. Then she lifted her face, +and the last gleam of the autumn sun smote her colourless lips and +swollen eyes. When she spoke again, it was like one speaking in her +sleep, or under the spell of somebody who had magnetised her. + +“It is wrong of me to think so much of myself, as if that were +everything. I ought to feel sorry for you too. You must be driven to it, +or you could never be so cruel.” + +With his face to the sea, he mumbled something about Pete, and she +caught up the name and said, “Yes, and Pete too. As you think it would +be wrong to Pete, I will not hold to you. Oh, it will be wrong to me +as well! But I will not give you the pain of turning a deaf ear to my +troubles any more.” + +She was struggling with a pitiless hope that perhaps she might regain +him after all. “If I give him up,” she thought, “he will love me for it;” + and then, with a sad ring in her voice, she said, “You will go on and +be a great man now, for you'll not have me to hold you back.” + +“For pity's sake, say no more of that,” he said, but she paid no heed. + +“I used to think it a wonderful thing to be loved by a great man. I +don't now. It is terrible. If I could only have you to myself! If you +could only be nothing to anybody else! You would be everything to me, +and what should I care then?” + +Between torture and love he had almost broken down at that, but he +gripped his breast and turned half aside, for his eyes were streaming. +She came up to him and touched with the tips of her fingers the hand +that hung by his side, and said in a voice like a child's, “Fancy! this +is the end of everything, and when we part now we are to meet no more. +Not the same way at all--not as we have met. You will be like anybody +else to me, and I will be like anybody else to you. Miss Cregeen, that +will be my name and you will be Mr. Christian. When you see me you'll +say to yourself, 'Yes, poor thing; long ago, when she was a girl, I made +her love me. Nobody ever loved me like that.' And fancy! when you pass +me in the street, you will not even look my way. You won't, will you? +No--no, it will be better not. Goodbye!” + +Her simple tenderness almost stifled him. He had to hold his under lip +with his teeth to keep back the cry that was bursting from his tongue. +At last he could bear it no longer, and he broke out, “Would to God we +had never loved each other! Would to God we had never met!” + +But she answered with the same childish sweetness, “Don't say that, +Philip. We have had some happy hours together. I would rather be parted +from you like this, though it is so hard, so cruel, than never to have +met you at all. Isn't it something for me to think of, that the truest, +cleverest, noblest man in all the world has loved me?... Good-bye!... +Good-bye!” + +His heart bled, his heart cried, but he uttered no sound. They were side +by side. She let his hand slip from the tips of her fingers, and drew +silently away. At three paces apart she paused, but he gave no sign. She +climbed the low brow of the hill slowly, very slowly, trying to command +her throat, which was fluttering, and looking back through her tears as +she went. Philip heard the shingle slip under her feet while she toiled +up the cliff, and when she reached the top the soft thud on the turf +seemed to beat on his heart. She stood there a moment against the sky, +waiting for a sound from the shore, a cry, a word, the lifting of a +hand, a sob, a sigh, her own name, “Kate,” and she was ready to fly back +even then, wounded and humiliated as she was, a poor torn bird that had +been struggling in the lime. But no; he was silent and motionless, and +she disappeared behind the hill. He saw her go, and all the light of +heaven went with her. + + + + +VIII. + +It was so far back home, so much farther than it had been to come. The +course is short and easy going out to sea when the tide is with you, and +the water is smooth, and the sun is shining, but long and hard coming +back to harbour, when the waves have risen, and the sky is low, and the +wind is on your bow. + +So far, so very far. She thought everybody looked at her, and knew her +for what she was--a broken, forsaken, fallen woman. And she was so tired +too; she wondered if her limbs would carry her. + +When Philip was left alone, the sky seemed to be lying on his shoulders. +The English mountains were grey and ghostly now, and the storm, which +had spent itself on the other coast, seemed to hang over the island. +There were breakers where the long dead sea had been, and the petrel +outside was scudding close to the white curves, and uttering its dismal +note. + +So heavy and confused had the storm and wreck of the last hour left him, +that he did not at first observe by the backward tail of smoke that the +steamer had passed round the Head, and that the cart he had met at the +mouth of the port had come back empty to the cave for another load of +sea-wrack. The lobster-fisher, too, had beached his boat near by, and +was shouting through the hollow air, wherein every noise seemed to +echo with a sepulchral quake, “The block was going whistling at the +mast-head. We'll have a squall I was thinking, so in I came.” + +That night Philip dreamt a dream. He was sitting on a dais with a wooden +canopy above him, the English coat of arms behind, and a great book in +front; his hands shook as he turned the leaves; he felt his leg hang +heavily; people bowed low to him, and dropped their voices in his +presence; he was the Deemster, and he was old. A young woman stood in +the dock, dripping water from her hair, and she had covered her face +with her hands. In the witness-box a young man was standing, and his +head was down. The man had delivered the woman to dishonour; she had +attempted her life in her shame and her despair. And looking on the man, +the Deemster thought he spoke in a stern voice, saying, “Witness, I am +compelled to punish her, but oh to heaven that I could punish you in her +place! What have you to say for yourself?” “I have nothing to say for +myself,” the young man answered, and he lifted his head and the old +Deemster saw his face. Then Philip awoke with a smothered scream, for +the young man's face had been his own. + + + + +IX. + +When Cæsar got to the quay, he looked about with watchful eyes, as if +fearing he might find somebody there before him. The coast was clear, +and he gave a grunt of relief. After fixing the horse-cloth, and +settling the mare in a nose-bag, he began to walk up and down the fore +part of the harbour, still keeping an eager look-out. As time went on +he grew comfortable, exchanged salutations with the harbour-master, and +even whistled a little to while away the time. + +“Quiet day, Mr. Quayle.” + +“Quiet enough yet, Mr. Cregeen; but what's it saying? 'The greater the +calm the nearer the south wind.'” + +By the time that Cæsar, from the end of the pier, saw the smoke of the +steamer coming round Kirk Maughold Head, he was in a spiritual, almost +a mournful, mood. He was feeling how melancholy was the task of going to +meet the few possessions, the clothes and such like, which were all that +remained of a dear friend departed. It was the duty of somebody, though, +and Cæsar drew a long breath of resignation. + +The steamer came up to the quay, and there was much bustle and +confusion. Cæsar waited, with one hand on the mare's neck, until the +worst of it was over. Then he went aboard, and said in a solemn voice +to the sailor at the foot of the gangway, “Anything here the property of +Mr. Peter Quilliam?” + +“That's his luggage,” said the sailor, pointing to a leather trunk of +moderate size among similar trunks at the mouth of the hatchway. + +“H'm!” said Cæsar, eyeing it sideways, and thinking how small it was. +Then, reflecting that perhaps valuable papers were all it was thought +worth while to send home, he added cheerfully, “I'll take it with me.” + +Somewhat to Cæsar's surprise, the sailor raised no difficulties, +but just as he was regarding the trunk with that faith which is the +substance of things hoped for, a big, ugly hand laid hold of it, and +began to rock it about like a pebble. + +It was Black Tom, smoking with perspiration. + +“Aisy, man, aisy,” said Cæsar, with lofty dignity. “I've the gig on the +quay.” + +“And I've a stiff cart on the market,” said Black Tom. + +“I'm wanting no assistance,” said Cæsar; “you needn't trouble yourself.” + +“Don't mention it, Cæsar,” said Black Tom, and he turned the trunk on +end and bent his back to lift it. + +But Cæsar put a heavy hand on top and said, “Gough bless me, man, but I +am sorry for thee. Mammon hath entered into thy heart, Tom.” + +“He have just popped out of thine, then,” said Black Tom, swirling the +trunk on one of its corners. + +But Cæsar held on, and said, “I don't know in the world why you should +let the devil of covetousness get the better of you.” + +“I don't mane to--let go the chiss,” said Black Tom, and in another +minute he had it on his shoulder. + +“Now, I believe in my heart,” said Cæsar, “I would be forgiven a little +violence,” and he took the trunk by both hands to bring it down again. + +“Let go the chiss, or I'll strek thee into the harbour,” bawled Black +Tom under his load. + +“The Philistines be upon thee, Samson,” cried Cæsar, and with that there +was a struggle. + +In the midst of the uproar, while the men were shouting into each +other's faces, and the trunk was rocking between them shoulder high, +a sunburnt man, with a thick beard and a formidable voice, a stalwart +fellow in a pilot jacket and wide-brimmed hat, came hurrying up the +cabin-stairs, and a dog came running behind him. A moment later he had +parted the two men, and the trunk was lying at his feet. + +Black Tom fell back a step, lifted his straw hat, scratched his bald +crown, and muttered in a voice of awe. “Holy sailor!” + +Cæsar's face was livid, and his eyes went up toward his forehead. “Lord +have mercy upon me,” he mumbled; “have mercy on my soul, O Lord.” + +“Don't be afraid,” said the stranger. “I'm a living man and not a +ghost.” + +“The man himself,” said Black Tom. + +“Peter Quilliam alive and hearty,” said Cæsar. + +“I am,” said Pete. “And now, what's the bobbery between the pair of you? +Shuperintending the beaching of my trunk, eh?” + +But having recovered from his terror at the idea that Pete was a spirit, +Cæsar began to take him to task for being a living man. “How's this?” + said he. “Answer me, young man, I've praiched your funeral.” + +“You'll have to do it again, Mr. Cregeen, for I'm not gone yet,” said +Pete. + +“No, but worth ten dead men still,” said Black Tom. “And my goodness, +boy, the smart and stout you're looking, anyway. Been thatching a bit on +the chin, eh? Foreign parts has made a man of you, Peter. The straight +you're like the family, too! You'll be coming up to the trough with +me--the ould home, you know. I'll be whipping the chiss ashore in a +jiffy, only Cæsar's that eager to help, it's wonderful. No, you'll not +then?” + +Pete was shaking his head as he went up the gangway, and seeing this, +Cæsar said severely-- + +“Lave the gentleman alone, Mr. Quilliam. He knows his own business +best.” + +“So do you, Mr. Collecting Box,” said Black Tom. “But your head's as +empty as a mollag, and as full of wind as well. It's a regular ould +human mollag you are, anyway, floating other people's nets and taking +all that's coming to them.” + +They were ashore by this time; one of the quay porters was putting +the trunk into the gig, and Cæsar was removing the horse-cloth and the +nose-bag. + +“Get up, Mr. Peter, and don't listen to him,” said Cæsar. “If +my industry and integrity have been blessed with increase under +Providence----” + +“Lave Providence out of it, you grasping ould Ebenezer, Zachariah, +Amen,” bawled Black Tom. + +“You've been flying in the face of Providence all your life, Tom,” said +Cæsar, taking his seat beside Pete. + +“You haven't though, you miser,” said Black Tom; “you'd sell your soul +for sixpence, and you'd raffle your ugly ould body if you could get +anybody to take tickets.” + +“Go home, Thomas,” said Cæsar, twiddling the reins, “go home and try for +the future to be a better man.” + +But that was too much for Black Tom. “Better man, is it? Come down on +the quay and up with your fiss, and I'll show you which of us is the +better man.” + +A moment later Cæsar and Pete were rattling over the cobbles of the +market-place, with the dog racing behind. Pete was full of questions. + +“And how's yourself, Mr. Cregeen?” + +“I'm in, sir, I'm in, sir, praise the Lord.” + +“And Grannie?” + +“Like myself, sir, not getting a dale younger, but caring little for +spiritual things, though.” + +“Going west, is she, poor ould angel? There ought to be a good piece of +daylight at her yet, for all. And--and Nancy Joe?” + +“A happy sinner still,” said Cæsar. “I suppose, sir, you'd be making +good money out yonder now? We were hearing the like, anyway.” + +“Money!” said Pete. “Well, yes. Enough to keep off the divil and the +coroner. But how's--how's----” + +“There now! For life, eh?” said Cæsar. + +“Yes, for life; but that's nothing,” said Pete; “how's----” + +“Wonderful!” cried Cæsar; “five years too! Boy veen, the light was +nearly took out of my eyes when I saw you.” + +“But Kate? How's Kate? How's the girl, herself?” said Pete nervously. + +“Smart uncommon,” said Cæsar. + +“God bless her!” cried Pete, with a shout that was heard across the +street. + +“We'll pick her up at Crellin's, it's like,” said Cæsar. + +“What? Crellin's round the corner--Crellin the draper's I Woa! Let me +down! The mare's tired, father;” and Pete was over the wheel at a bound. + +He came out of the shop saying Kate had left word that her father was +not to wait for her--she would perhaps be home before him. Amid a crowd +of the “mob beg” children of the streets, to whom he showered coppers +to be scrambled for, Pete got up again to Cæsar's side, and they set off +for Sulby. The wind had risen suddenly, and was hooting down the narrow +streets coming up from the harbour. + +“And Philip? How's Philip?” shouted Pete. + +“Mr. Christian? Well and hearty, and doing wonders, sir.” + +“I knew it,” cried Pete, with a resounding laugh. + +“Going like a flood, and sweeping everything before him,” said Cæsar. + +“The rising day with him, is it?” said Pete. “I always said he'd be the +first man in the island, and he's not going to deceave me neither.” + +“The young man's been over putting a sight on us times and times--he was +up at my Melliah only a week come Wednesday,” said Cæsar. + +“Man alive!” cried Pete; “him and me are same as brothers.” + +“Then it wasn't true what they were writing in the letter, sir--that +your black boys left you for dead?” + +“They did that, bad luck to them,” said Pete; “but I was thinking it no +sin to disappoint them, though.” + +“Well, well! lying began with the world, and with the world it will +end,” said Cæsar. + +As they passed Ballywhaine, Pete shouted into Cæsar's ear, above the +wind that was roaring in the trees, and scattering the ripening leaves +in clouds, “And how's Dross?” + +“That wastrel? Aw, tearing away, tearing away,” said Cæsar. + +“Floating on the top of the tide, is he?” shouted Pete. + +“Maybe so, but the devil is fishing where yonder fellow's swimming,” + answered Cæsar. + +“And the ould man--the Ballawhaine--still above the sod?” bawled Pete +behind his hand. + +“Yes, but failing, failing, failing,” shouted Cæsar. “The world's +getting too heavy for the man. Debts here, and debts there, and debts +everywhere.” + +“Not much water in the harbour then, eh?” cried Pete. + +“No, but down on the rocks already, if it's only myself that knows it,” + shouted Cæsar. + +When they had turned the Sulby Bridge, and come in sight of “The Manx +Fairy,” Pete's excitement grew wild, and he leaped up from his seat and +shouted above the wind like a man possessed. + +“My gough, the very place! You've been thatching, though--yes, you have. +The street! Holy sailor, there it is! Brownie at you still? Her heifer, +is it? Get up, Molly! A taste of the whip'll do the mare no harm, sir. +My sakes, here's ould Flora hobbling out to meet us. Got the rheumatics, +has she? Set me down, Cæsar. Here we are, man. Lord alive, the smell of +the cowhouse. That warm and damp, it's grand! What, don't you know me, +Flo? Got your temper still, if you've lost your teeth? My sakes, the +haggard! The same spot again! It's turf they're burning inside! And, +my gracious, that's herrings roasting in their brine! Where's Grannie, +though? Let's put a sight in, Cæsar. Well, well, aw well, aw well!” + +Thus Pete came home, laughing, shouting, bawling, and bellowing above +the tumult of the wind, which had risen by this time to the strength of +a gale. + +“Mother,” cried Cæsar, going in at the porch, “gentleman here from +foreign parts to put a word on you.” + +“I never had nobody there belonging to me,” began Grannie. + +“No, then, nobody?” said Cæsar. + +“One that was going to be, maybe, if he'd lived, poor boy----” + +“Grannie!” shouted Pete, and he burst into the bar-room. + +“Goodness me!” cried Grannie; “it's his own voice anyway.” + +“It's himself,” shouted Pete, and the old soul was in his arms in an +instant. + +“Aw dear! Aw dear!” she panted. “Pete it is for sure. Let me sit down, +though.” + +“Did you think it was his ghost, then, mother!” said Cæsar with an +indulgent air. + +“'Deed no,” said Grannie. “The lad wouldn't come back to plague nobody, +thinks I.” + +“Still, and for all the uprisement of Peter, it bates everything,” said +Cæsar. “It's a sort of a resurrection. I thought I'd have a sight up +to the packet for his chiss, poor fellow, and, behould ye, who should I +meet in the two eyes but the man himself!” + +“Aw, dear! It's wonderful I it's terrible! I'm silly with the joy,” said +Grannie. + +“It was lies in the letter the Manx ones were writing,” said Cæsar. + +“Letters and writings are all lies,” said Grannie. “As long as I live +I'll take no more of them, and if that Kelly, the postman, comes here +again, I'll take the bellows to him.” + +“So you thought I was gone for good, Grannie?” said Pete. “Well, I +thought so too. 'Will I die?' I says to myself times and times; but I +bethought me at last there wasn't no sense in a good man like me laving +his bones out on the bare Veldt yonder; so, you see, I spread my wings +and came home again.” + +“It's the Lord's doings--it's marvellous in our eyes,” said Cæsar; and +Grannie, who had recovered herself and was bustling about, cried-- + +“Let me have a right look at him, then. Goodness me, the whisker! And as +soft as Manx carding from the mill, too. I like him best when he takes +off his hat. Well, I'm proud to see you, boy. 'Deed, but I wouldn't have +known you, though. 'Who's the gentleman in the gig with father?' thinks +I. And I'd have said it was the Dempster himself, if he hadn't been dead +and in his coffin.” + +“That'll do, that'll do,” roared Pete. “That's Grannie putting the fun +on me.” + +“It's no use talking, but I can't keep quiet; no I can't,” cried +Grannie, and with that she whipped up a bowl from the kitchen dresser +and fell furiously to peeling the potatoes that were there for supper. + +“But where's Kate?” said Pete. + +“Aw, yes, where is she? Kate! Kate!” called Grannie, leaning her head +toward the stairs, and Nancy Joe, who had been standing silent until +now, said---- + +“Didn't she go to Ramsey with the gig, woman?” + +“Aw, the foolish I am! Of course she did,” said Grannie; “but why hasn't +she come back with father?” + +“She left word at Crellin's not to wait,” said Cæsar. + +“She'll be gone to Miss Clucas's to try on,” said Nancy. + +“Wouldn't trust now,” said Grannie. “She's having two new dresses done, +Pete. Aw, girls are ter'ble. Well, can you blame them either?” + +“She shall have two-and-twenty if she likes, God bless her,” said Pete. + +“Goodness me!” said Nancy, “is the man for buying frocks for a Mormon?” + +“But you'll be empty, boy. Put the crow down and the griddle on, Nancy,” + said Grannie. “We'll have cakes. Cakes? Coorse I said cakes. Get me +the cloth and I'll lay it myself. The cloth, I'm saying, woman. Did you +never hear of a tablecloth? Where is it? Aw, dear knows where it is +now! It's in the parlour; no, it's in the chest on the landing; no, it's +under the sheets of my own bed. Fetch it, bogh.” + +“Will I bring you a handful of gorse, mother?” said Cæsar. + +“Coorse you will, and not stand chattering there. But I'm laving you +dry, Pete. Is it ale you'll have, or a drop of hard stuff? You'll wait +for Kate? Now I like that. There's some life at these totallers. 'Steady +abroad?' How dare you, Nancy Joe? You're a deal too clever. Of course +he's been steady abroad--steady as a gun.” + +“But Kate,” said Pete, tramping the sanded floor, “is she changed at +all?” + +“Aw, she's a woman now, boy,” said Grannie. + +“Bless my soul!” said Pete. + +“She was looking a bit white and narvous one while there, but she's +sprung out of it fresh and bright, same as the ling on the mountains. +Well, that's the way with young women.” + +“I know,” said Pete. “Just the break of the morning with the darlings.” + +“But she's the best-looking girl on the island now, Pete,” said Nancy +Joe. + +“I'll go bail on it,” cried Pete. + +“Big and fine and rosy, and fit for anything.” + +“Bless my heart!” + +“You should have seen her at the Melliah; it was a trate.” + +“God bless me!” + +“Sun-bonnet and pink frock and tight red stockings, and straight as a +standard rase.” + +“Hould your tongue, woman,” shouted Pete. “I'll see herself first, and +I'm dying to do it.” + +Cæsar came back with the gorse; Nancy fed the fire and Grannie stirred +the oatmeal and water. And while the cakes were baking, Pete tramped the +kitchen and examined everything and recognised old friends with a roar. + +“Bless me! the same place still. There's the clock on the shelf, with +the scratch on its face and the big finger broke at the joint, and the +lath--and the peck--and the whip--you've had it new corded, though----” + +“'Sakes, how the boy remembers!” cried Grannie. + +“And the white rumpy” (the cat had leapt on to the dresser out of +the reach of Pete's dog, and from that elevation was eyeing him +steadfastly), “and the slowrie--and the kettle--and the poker--my +gracious, the very poker----” + +“Now, did you ever!” cried Grannie with amazement. + +“And--yes--no--it is, though--I'll swear it before the +Dempster--that's,” said Pete, picking up a three-legged stool, “that's +the very stool she was sitting on herself in the fire-seat in front of +the turf closet. Let me sit there now for the sake of ould times gone +by.” + +He put the stool in the fireplace and sat on it, shouting as he did so +between a laugh and a cry, “Aw, Grannie, bogh--Grannie, bogh! to think +there's been half the world between us since I was sitting here before!” + +And Grannie herself, breaking down, said, “Wouldn't you like the tongs, +boy? Give the boy the tongs, woman, just to say he's at home.” + +Pete plucked the tongs out of Nancy's hands, and began feeding the +fire with the gorse. “Aw, Grannie, have I ever been away?” he cried, +laughing, and his wet eyes gleaming. + +“Nancy Joe, have you no nose at all?” cried Grannie. “The cake's burning +to a cinder.” + +“Let it burn, mother,” shouted Pete. “It's the way she was doing herself +when she was young and forgetting. Shillings a-piece for all that's +wasted. Aw, the smell of it's sweet!” + +So saying he piled the gorse on the fire, ramming it under the griddle +and choking it behind the crow. And while the oatcake crackled and +sparched and went black, he sniffed up the burning odour, and laughed +and cried in the midst of the smoke that went swirling up the chimney. + +And meanwhile, Grannie herself, with the tears rolling down her cheeks, +was flapping her apron before her face and saying, “He'll make me die of +laughing, he will, though--yes, he will!” But behind the apron she was +blubbering to Nancy, “It's coming home, woman, that's it--it's just +coming home again, poor boy!” + +By this time word of Pete's return had gone round Sulby? and the +bar-room was soon thronged with men and women, who looked through the +glass partition into the kitchen at the bronzed and bearded man who sat +smoking by the fire, with his dog curled up at his feet. “There'll be a +wedding soon,” said one. “The girl's in luck,” said another. “Success to +the fine girl she always was, and lucky they kept her from the poor +toot that was beating about on her port bow.”--“The young Ballawhaine, +eh?”--“Who else?” + +Presently the dog went out to them, and, in default of its master, +became a centre of excited interest. It was an old creature, with a +settled look of age, and a gravity of expression that seemed to say he +had got over the follies of youth, and was now reserved and determined +to keep the peace. His back was curved in as if a cart-wheel had gone +over his spine, he had gigantic ears, a stump of a tail, a coat thin and +prickly like the bristles of a pig, but white and spotted with brown. + +“Lord save us! a queer dog, though--what's his breed at all?” said one; +and then a resounding voice came from the kitchen doorway, saying-- + +“A sort of a Manxman crossed with a bat. Got no tail to speak of, but +there's plenty of ears at him. A handy sort of a dog, only a bit spoiled +in his childhood. Not fit for much company anyway, and no more notion of +dacent behaviour than my ould shoe. Down, Dempster, down.” + +It was Pete. He was greeted with loud welcomes, and soon filled the room +all round with the steaming odour of spirits and water. + +“You've the Manx tongue at you still, Mr. Quilliam,” said Jonaique; “and +you're calling the dog Dempster; what's that for at all?” + +“For sake of the ould island, Mr. Jelly, and for the straight he's like +Dempster Mylrea when he's a bit crooked,” said Pete. + +“The old man's dead, sir,” said John the Clerk. + +“You don't say?” said Pete. + +“Yes, though; the sun went down on him a Wednesday. The drink, sir, the +drink! I've been cutting a sod of his grave to-day.” + +“And who's to be Dempster now?” asked Pete. “Who are they putting in for +it?” + +“Well,” said John the Clerk, “they're talking and talking, and some's +saying this one and others that one; but the most is saying your ould +friend Philip Christian.” + +“I knew it--I always said it,” shouted Pete; “best man in the island, +bar none. Oh, he'll not deceave me.” + +The wind was roaring in the chimney, and the light was beginning to +fail. Pete became restless, and walked to and fro, peering out at +intervals by the window that looked on to the road. At this there was +some pushing and nudging and indulgent whispering. + +“It's the girl! Aw, be aisy with the like! Five years apart, be aisy!” + +“The meadow's white with the gulls sitting together like parrots; what's +that a sign of, father?” said Pete. + +“Just a slant of rain maybe, and a puff of wind,” said Cæsar. + +“But,” said Pete, looking up at the sky, “the long cat tail was going +off at a slant awhile ago, and now the thick skate yonder is hanging +mortal low.” + +“Take your time, sir,” said Cæsar. “No need to send round the Cross +Vustha (fiery cross) yet. The girl will be home immadiently.” + +“It'll be dark at her, though,” said Pete. + +The company tried to draw him into conversation about the ways of life +in the countries he had visited, but he answered absently and jerkily, +and kept going to the door. + +“Suppose there'll be Dempsters enough where you're coming from?” said +Jonaique. + +“Sort of Dempsters, yes. Called one of them Ould Necessity, because it +knows no law. He rigged up the statute books atop of his stool for a +high sate, and when he wanted them he couldn't find them high or low. +Not the first judge that's sat on the law, though.... It's coming, +Cæsar, d'ye hear it? That's the rain on the street.” + +“Aisy, man, aisy, man,” said Cæsar. “New dresses isn't rigged up in no +time. There'll be chapels now, eh? Chapels and conferences, and proper +religious instruction?” + +“Divil a chapel, sir, only a rickety barn, belonging to some-ones +they're calling the Sky Pilots to. Wanted the ould miser that runs it to +build them a new tabernacle, but he wouldn't part till a lump of plaster +fell on his bald head at a love-feast, and then he planked down +a hundred pound, and they all shouted, 'Hit him again, Lord--you +might!'... D'ye hear that, then? That's the water coming down from the +gill. I can't stand no more of it, Grannie.” + +Grannie was at the door, struggling to hold it against the wind, while +she looked out into the gathering darkness. “'Deed, but I'm getting +afraid of it myself,” she said, “and dear heart knows where Kirry can be +at this time of night.” “I'm off to find her,” said Pete, and, catching +up his hat and whistling to the dog, in a moment he was gone. + + + + +X. + +The door was hard to close behind him, for it was now blowing a gale +from the north-east. Cæsar slipped through the dairy to see if the +outbuildings were safe, and came back with a satisfied look. The stable +and cow-house were barred, the barns were shut up, the mill-wheel was on +the brake, the kiln fire was burning gently, and all was snug and tight. +Grannie was wringing her hands as he returned, crying “Kate! Oh, Kate!” + and he reproved her for want of trust in Providence. + +People were now coming in rapidly with terrible stories of damage done +by the storm. It was reported that the Chicken Rock Lighthouse was blown +down, that the tide had risen to twenty-five feet in Ramsey and torn up +the streets, and that a Peel fisherman had been struck by his mainsail +into the sea and drowned. + +More came into the house at every minute, and among them were all the +lonesome and helpless ones within a radius of a mile--Blind Jane, who +charmed blood, but could not charm the wind; Shemiah, the prophet, with +beard down to his waist and a staff up to his shoulder; and old Juan +Vessy, who “lived on the houses” in the way of a tramp. The people +who had been there already were afraid to go out, and Grannie, still +wringing her hands and crying “Kate, Kate,” called everybody into the +kitchen to gather about the fire. There they bemoaned their boys on the +sea, told stories of former storms, and quarrelled about the years of +wrecks and the sources of the winds that caused them. + +The gale increased to fearful violence, and sometimes the wind sounded +like sheets flapping against the walls, sometimes like the deep boom of +the waves that roll on themselves in mid-ocean and never know a shore. +It began to groan in the chimney as if it were a wild beast struggling +to escape, and then the smoke came down in whorls and filled the +kitchen. They had to put out the fire to keep themselves from +suffocation, and to sit back from the fireplace to protect themselves +from cold. The door of the porch flew open, and they barricaded it with +long-handled brushes; the windows rattled in their frames, and they +blocked them up with the tops of the tables. In spite of all efforts +to shut out the wind, the house was like a basket, and it quaked like a +ship at sea. “I never heard the like on the water itself, and I'm used +of the sea, too,” said one. The others groaned and mumbled prayers. + +Kelly the Thief, who had come in unopposed by Grannie, was on his knees +in one corner with his face to the wall, calling on the Lord to remember +that he had seen things in letters--stamps and such--but had never +touched them. John the Clerk was saying that he had to bury the +Deemster; Jonaique, the barber, that he had been sent for to “cut” the +Bishop; and Claudius Kewley, the farmer, that he had three fields of +barley still uncut and a stack of oats unthatched. “Oh, Lord,” cried +Claudius, “let me not die till I've got nothing to do!” + +Cæsar stood like a strong man amidst their moans and groans, their +bowings of the head and clappings of the hands, and, when he heard the +farmer, his look was severe. + +“Cloddy,” said he, “how do you dare to doubt the providence of God?” + +“Aisy to talk, Mr. Cregeen,” the farmer whined, “but you've got your own +harvest saved,” and then Cæsar had no resource but to punish the man in +prayer. “The Lord had sent His storm to reprove some that were making +too sure of His mercies; but there was grace in the gale, only they +wouldn't be patient and trust to God's providence; there was milk in +the breast, only the wayward child wouldn't take time to find the teat. +Lord, lead them to true stillness----” + +In the midst of Cæsar's prayer there was a sudden roar outside, and he +leapt abruptly to his feet with a look of vexation. “I believe in my +heart that's the mill-wheel broken loose,” said he, “and if it is, the +corn on the kiln will be going like a whirlingig.” + +“Trust in God's providence, Cæsar,” cried the farmer. + +“So I will,” said Cæsar, catching up his hat, “but I'll put out my kiln +fire first.” + +When Pete stepped out of the porch, he felt himself smitten as by an +invisible wing, and he gasped like a fish with too much air. A quick +pain in the side at that moment reminded him of his bullet-wound, +but his heels had heart in them, and he set off to run. The night had +fallen, but a green rent was torn in the leaden sky, and through this +the full moon appeared. + +When he got to Ramsey the tide was up to the old cross, slates were +flying like kites, and the harbour sounded like a battlefield with its +thunderous roar of rigging. He made for the dressmaker's, and heard that +Kate had not been there for six hours. At the draper's he learned that +at two o'clock in the afternoon she had been seen going up Ballure. The +sound rocket was fired as he pushed through the town. A schooner riding +to an anchor in the bay was flying her ensign for help. The sea was +terrific--a slaty grey, streaked with white foam like quartz veins; but +the men who had been idling on the quay when the water was calm were now +struggling, chafing, and fighting to go out on it, for the blood of the +old Vikings was in them. + +Going by the water-trough, Pete called on Black Tom, who was civil +and conciliatory until he heard his errand, then growled with +disappointment, but nevertheless answered his question. Yes, he had +seen the young woman. She went up early in the “everin,” and left him +good-day. Giving this grateful news, Black Tom could not deny himself +a word of bitterness to poison the pleasure. “And when you are finding +her,” said he, “you'll be doing well to take her in tow, for I'm +thinking there's some that's for throwing her a rope.” + +“Who d'ye mane?” said Pete. + +“I lave it with you,” said Black Tom; and Pete pulled the door after +him. + +On the breast of the hill there was the meeting of two roads, one of +them leading up to the “Hibernian,” the other going down to Port Mooar. +To resolve the difficulty of choice, Pete inquired at a cottage standing +some paces beyond, and as Kate had not been seen to pass up the higher +road, he determined to take the lower one. But he gathered no tidings +by the way, for Billy by the mill knew nothing, and the woman by the +sundial had gone to bed. At length he dipped into Port Mooar, and came +to a little cottage like a child's Noah's ark, with its tiny porch and +red light inside, looking out on the white breakers that were racing +along the beach. It was the cottage of the lobster-fisher. Pete inquired +if he had seen Kate. He answered no; he had seen nobody that day but Mr. +Christian. Which of the Christians? Mr. Philip Christian. + +The news carried only one message to Pete's mind. It seemed to explain +something which had begun to perplex him--why Philip had not met him at +the quay, and why Kate had not heard of his coming. Clearly Philip was +at present at Ballure. He had not yet received the telegram addressed to +Douglas. + +Pete turned back. Surely Kate had called somewhere. She would be at home +by this time. He tried to run, but the wind was now in his face. It was +veering northwards every minute, and rising to the force of a hurricane. +He tied his handkerchief over his head and under his chin to hold on his +hat. His hair whipped his ears like rods. Sometimes he was swept into +the hedge; often he was brought to his knees. Still he toiled along +through sheets of spray that glistened with the colours of a rainbow, +and ran over the ground like driven rain. His eyes smarted, and the +taste on his lips was salt. + +The moon was now riding at the full through a wild flecked sky, and +Pete could clearly see, as he returned towards the bay, a crowd of human +figures on the cliffs above Port Lewaige. Quaking with undefined fears, +he pushed on until he had joined them. The schooner, abandoned by her +crew, had parted her cable, and was rolling like a blinded porpoise +towards the rocks. She fell on them with the groan of a living creature, +and, the instant her head was down, the white lions of the sea leapt +over her with a howl, the water swirled through her bulwarks and filled +her hatches, her rudder was unshipped, her sails were torn from their +gaskets, and the floating home wherein men had sailed, and sung, +and slept, and laughed, and jested, was a broken wreck in the heavy +wallowings of the waves. + +Kate had not returned when Pete got back to Sulby, but the excitement of +her absence was eclipsed for the time by the turmoil of Cæsar's trouble. +Standing in the dark on the top of the midden, he was shouting to the +dairy door in a voice of thunder, which went off at the end of his +beard like the puling of a cat. The mill-wheel was going same as a +“whirlingig”--was there nobody to “hould the brake?” The stable roof was +stripped, and the mare was tearing herself to pieces in a roaring “pit +of hell”--was there never a shoulder for the door? The cow-house thatch +was flapping like a sail--was there nothing in the world but a woman +(Nancy Joe) to help a man to throw a ladder and a stone over it? + +Only when Cæsar had been pacified was there silence to speak of Kate. “I +picked up news of her coming back by Claughbane,” said Pete, “and traced +her as near home as the 'Ginger.' She can't be far away. Where is she?” + +Those who were cool enough fell to conjecture. Grannie had no resource +but groans. Nancy was moaning by her side. The rest were full of their +own troubles. Blind Jane was bewailing her affliction. + +“You can all see,” she cried, “but I'm not knowing the harm that's +coming on me.” + +“Hush, woman, hush,” said Pete; “we're all same as yourself half our +lives--we're all blind at night.” + +In the midst of the tumult a knock came to the door, and Pete made a +plunge towards the porch. + +“Wait,” cried Cæsar. “Nobody else comes here to-night except the girl +herself. Another wind like the last and we'll have the roof off the +house too.” + +Then he called to the new-comer, with his face to the porch door, and +the answer came back to him in a wail like the wind itself. + +“Who's there?” + +It was Joney from the glen. + +“We're like herrings in a barrel--we can't let you in.” + +She wasn't wanting to come in. But her roof was going stripping, and +half her house was felled, and she couldn't get her son (the idiot boy) +to leave his bed. He would perish; he would die; he was all the family +she had left to her--wouldn't the master come and save him? + +“Impossible!” shouted Cæsar. “We've our own missing this fearful night, +Joney, and the Lord will protect His children.” + +Was it Kate? She had seen her in the glen---- + +“Let me get at that door,” said Pete. + +“But the house will come down,” cried Cæsar. + +“Let it come,” said Pete. + +Pete shut the door of the bar-room, and then the wind was heard to swirl +through the porch. + +“When did you see her, Joney, and where?” said the voice of Pete; and +the voice of Joney answered him-- + +“Goings by my own house at the start of the storm this everin.” + +“I'll come with you--go on,” said Pete, and Grannie shouted across the +bar-- + +“Take Cæsar's topcoat over your monkey-jacket.” + +“I've sail enough already for a wind like this, mother,” cried the +voice of Pete, and then the swirling sound in the porch went off with a +long-drawn whirr, and Cæsar came back alone to the kitchen. + +Pete's wound ached again, but he pressed his hand on the place of it and +struggled up the glen, dragging Joney behind him. They came to her house +at last. One half of the thatch lay over the other half; the rafters +were bare like the ribs of the wreck; the oat-cake peck was rattling on +the lath; the meal-barrel in the corner was stripped of its lid, and +the meal was whirling into the air like a waterspout; the dresser was +stripped, the broken crockery lay on the uncovered floor, and the iron +slowrie hanging over the place of the fire was swinging and striking +against the wall, and ringing like a knell. And in the midst of this +scene of desolation the idiot boy was placidly sleeping on his naked +bed, and over it the moon was scudding through a tattered sky. + +The night wore on, and the company in the kitchen listened long, and +sometimes heard sounds as of voices crying in the wind, but Pete did not +return. Then they fell to groaning again, to praying aloud without fear, +and to confessing their undiscovered sins without shame. + +“I'm searched terrible--I can see through me,” cried Kelly, the postman. + +Some were chiefly troubled lest death should fall on them while they +were in a public-house. + +“I keep none,” cried Cæsar. + +“But you wouldn't let us open the door,” whined the farmer. + +If the door had been wide enough for a Bishop, not a soul would have +stirred. For the first time within anyone's recollection, Nancy Joe was +on her knees. + +“O Lord,” she prayed, “Thou knowest well I don't often bother Thee. +But save Kate, Lord; oh, save and prasarve my little Kirry! It's twenty +years and better since I asked anything of Thee before and if Thou wilt +only take away this wind, I'll promise not to say another prayer for +twenty years more.” + +“Say it in Manx, woman,” moaned Grannie. “I always say my prayers in +Manx as well, and the Lord can listen to the one He knows best.” + +“There's prayer as well as praise in singing,” cried Cæsar; and they +began to sing, all down on their knees, their eyes tightly closed, and +their hands clasped before their faces. They sang of heaven and its +peaceful plains, its blue lakes and sunny skies, its golden cities and +emerald gates, its temples and its tabernacles, where “congregations +ne'er break up and Sabbaths never end.” It was some comfort to drown +with the wild discord of their own voices the fearful noises of the +tempest. When they finished the hymn, they began on it again, keeping +it up without a break, sweeping the dying note of the last word into +the rising pitch of the first one. In the midst of their singing, +they thought a fiercer gust than ever was beating on the door, and, to +smother the fear of it, they sang yet louder. The gust came a second +time, and Cæsar cried-- + +“Again, brothers,” and away they went with another wild whoop through +the hymn. + +It came a third time, and Cæsar cried-- + +“Once more, beloved,” and they raced madly through the hymn again. + +Then the door burst open as before a tremendous kick, and Pete, fierce +and wild-eyed, and green with the drift of the salt foam caked thick on +his face, stepped over the threshold with the unconscious body of Kate +in his arms and the idiot boy peering over his shoulder. + +“Thank the Lord for an answer to prayer,” cried Cæsar. “Where did you +find her?” + +“In the tholthan up the glen,” said Pete. “Up in the witch's tholthan.” + + + + +XI. + +On the second morning afterwards the air was quiet and full of the odour +of seaweed; the sky was round as the inside of a shell, and pale pink +like the shadow of flame; the water was smooth and silent; the hills +had lost the memory of the storm, and land and sea lay like a sleeping +child. + +In this broad and steady morning Kate came back to consciousness. She +had slid out of delirium into sleep as a boat slides out of the open +sea into harbour, and when she awoke there was a voice in her ears that +seemed to be calling to her from the quay. It was a familiar voice, and +yet it was unfamiliar; it was like the voice of a friend heard for the +first time after a voyage. It seemed to come from a long way off, and +yet to be knocking at the very door of her heart. She kept her eyes +closed for a moment and listened; then she opened them and looked again. + +The light was clouded and yet dazzling, as if glazed muslin were +shaking before her eyes. Grannie was sitting by her bedside, knitting in +silence. + +“Why are you sitting there, mother?” she asked. + +Grannie dropped her needles and caught at her apron. “Dear heart alive, +the child's herself again!” she said. + +“Has anything happened?” said Kate. “What time is it?” + +“Monday morning, bogh, thank the Lord for all His mercies!” cried +Grannie. + +The familiar voice came again. It came from the direction of the stairs. +“Who's that?” said Kate, whispering fearfully. + +“Pete himself, Kirry. Aw well! Aw dear!” + +“Pete!” cried Kate in terror. + +“Aw, no, woman, but a living man come back again. No fear of him, bogh! +Not dead at all, but worth twenty dead men yet, and he brought you safe +out of the storm.” + +“The storm?” + +“Yes, the storm, woman. There warn such a storm on the island I don't +know the years. He found you in the tholthan up the glen. Lost your way +in the wind, it's like, and no wonder. But let me call father. Father! +father! Chut! the man's as deaf as little Tom Hommy. Father!” called +Grannie, bustling about at the stair-head in a half-demented way. + +There was some commotion below, and the voice on the stairs was saying, +“_This_ way? No, _sir_. That way, if _you_ plaze.” + +“D'ye hear him, Kirry?” cried Grannie, putting her head back into the +room. “That's the man himself. Sitting on the bottom step same as +an ould bulldog, and keeping watch that nobody bothers you. The +good-naturedst bulldog breathing, though, and he hasn't had a wink on +the night. Saved your life, darling. He did; yes, he did, praise God.” + +At mention of the tholthan, Kate had remembered everything. She dropped +back on the pillow, and cried, in a voice of pain, “Why couldn't he +leave me to die?” + +Grannie chuckled knowingly at that, and wiped her eyes with the corner +of her apron. “The bogh is herself, for sure. When they're wishing +themselves dead they're always mending father! But I'll go down +instead. Lie still, bogh, lie still!” + +The voice of Grannie went muffled down the stairs with many “Aw dears, +aw dears!” and then crackled from below through the floor and the +unceiled joists, saying sharply but with a tremor, too, “Nancy Joe, why +aren't you taking a cup of something upstairs, woman?” + +“Goodness me, Mistress Cregeen, is it true for all?” said Nancy. + +“Why, of course it's true. Do you think a poor child is going fasting +for ever?” + +“What's that?” shouted the familiar voice again. “Was it herself you +were spaking to in the dairy loft, Grannie?” + +“Who else, man?” said Grannie, and then there was a general tumult. + +“Aw, the joy! Aw, the delight! Gough bless me, Grannie, I was thinking +she was for spaking no more.” + +“Out of the way,” cried Nancy, as if pushing past somebody to whip the +kettle on to the fire. “These men creatures have no more rising in their +hearts than bread without balm.” + +“You're balm enough yourself, Nancy, for a quiet husband. But lend me a +hould of the bellows there--I'll blow up like blazes.” + +Cæsar came into the house on the top of this commotion, grumbling as +he stepped over the porch, “The wind has taken half the stacks of my +haggard, mother.” + +“No matter, sir,” shouted Pete. “The best of your Melliah is saved +upstairs.” + +“Is she herself?” said Cæsar. “Praise His name!” + +And over the furious puffing and panting and quacking of the bellows and +the cracking and roaring of the fire, the voice of Pete came in gusts +through the floor, crying, “I'll go mad with the joy! I will; yes, I +will, and nobody shall stop me neither.” + +The house, which seemed to have been holding its breath since the storm, +now broke into a ripple of laughter. It began in the kitchen, it ran up +the stairs, it crept through the chinks in the floor, it went over the +roof. But Kate lay on her pillow and moaned, and turned her face to the +wall. + +Presently Nancy Joe appeared in the bedroom, making herself tidy at the +doorway with a turn of the hand over her hair. “Mercy on me!” she cried, +clapping her hands at the first sight of Kate's face, “who was the +born blockhead that said the girl's wedding was as like to be in the +churchyard as in the church?” + +“That's me,” said a deep voice from the middle of the stairs, and then +Nancy clashed the door back and poured Pete into Kate in a broadside. + +“It was Pete that done it, though,” she said. “You can't expect much +sense of the like, but still and for all he saved your life, Kitty. Dr. +Mylechreest says so. 'If the girl had been lying out another hour,' says +he----And, my goodness, the fond of you that man is; it's wonderful! +Twisting and turning all day yesterday on the bottom step yonder same as +a live conger on the quay, but looking as soft about the eyes as if he'd +been a week out of the water. And now! my sakes, _now!_ D'ye hear him, +Kirry? He's fit to burst the bellows. No use, though--he's a shocking +fine young fellow--he's all that.... But just listen!” + +There was a fissing sound from below, and a sense of burning. “What do +I always say? You can never trust a man to have sense enough to take it +off. That's the kettle on the boil.” + +Nancy went flopping downstairs, where with furious words she rated Pete, +who laughed immoderately. Cæsar came next. He had taken off his boots +and was walking lightly in his stockings; but Kate felt his approach by +his asthmatic breathing. As he stepped in at the door he cried, in the +high pitch of the preacher, “Praise the Lord, O my soul, and all that is +within me praise His holy name!” Then he fell to the praise of Pete as +well. + +“He brought you out of the jaws of death and the mouth of Satan. It +was a sign, Katherine, and we can't do better than follow the Spirit's +leading. He saved your life, woman, and that's giving him the right to +have and to hould it. Well, I've only one child in this life, but, if +it's the Lord's will, I'm willing. He was always my white-headed boy, +and he has made his independent fortune in a matter of five years' +time.” + +The church bell began to toll, and Kate started up and listened. + +“Only the Dempster's funeral, Kitty,” said Cæsar. “They were for burying +him to-morrow, but men that drink don't keep. They'll be putting him in +the family vault at Lezayre with his father, the staunch ould Rechabite. +Many a good cow has a bad calf, you see, and that's bad news for a man's +children; but many a good calf is from a bad cow, and that's good news +for the man himself. It's been the way with Peter anyway, for the +Lord has delivered him and prospered him, and I'm hearing on the best +authority he has five thousand golden sovereigns sent home to Mr. +Dumbell's bank at Douglas.” + +Grannie came up with a basin of beef-tea, and Cæsar was hustled out of +the room. + +“Come now, bogh; take a spoonful, and I'll lave you to yourself,” said +Grannie. + +“Yes, leave me to myself,” said Kate, sipping wearily; and then Grannie +went off with the basin in her hand. + +“Has she taken it?” said some one below. + +“Look at that, if you plaze,” said Grannie in a jubilant tone; and Kate +knew that the empty basin was being shown around. + +Kate lay back on the pillow, listened to the tolling of the bell, and +shuddered. She thought it a ghostly thing that the first voice she had +heard on coming as from another world had been the voice of Pete, and +the first name dinned into her ears had been Pete's name. The procession +of the Deemster's funeral passed the house, and she closed her eyes +and seemed to see it--the coffin on the open cart, the men on horseback +riding beside it, and then the horses tied up to posts and gates +about the churchyard, and the crowd of men of all conditions at the +grave-side. In her mind's eye, Kate was searching through that crowd for +somebody. Was _he_ there? Had he heard what had happened to her? + +She fell into a doze, and was awakened by a horse's step on the road, +and the voices of two men talking as they came nearer. + +“Man alive, the joy I'm taking to see you! The tallygraph? Coorse not. +Knew I'd find you at the funeral, though.” It was Pete. + +“But I meant to come over after it.” It was Philip, and Kate's heart +stood still. + +The voices were smothered for a moment (as the buzzing is when the bees +enter the hive), and then began with as sharper ring from the rooms +below. + +“How's she now, Mrs. Cregeen?” said the voice of Philip. + +“Better, sir--much better,” answered Grannie. + +“No return of the unconsciousness?” + +“Aw, no,” said Grannie. + +“Was she”--Kate thought the voice faltered--“was she delirious?” + +“Not rambling at all,” replied Grannie. + +“Thank God,” said Philip, and Kate felt a long breath of relief go +through the air. + +“I didn't hear of it until this morning,” said Philip. “The postman told +me at breakfast-time, and I called on Dr. Mylechreest coming out. If I +had known----I didn't sleep much last night, anyway; but if I had ever +imagined----” + +“You're right good to the girl, sir,” said Grannie, and then Kate, +listening intently, caught a quavering sound of protestation. + +“'Deed you are, though, and always have been,” said Grannie, “and I'm +saying it before Pete here, that ought to know and doesn't.” + +“Don't I, though?” came in the other voice--the resounding voice--the +voice full of laughter and tears together. “But I do that, Grannie, same +as if I'd been here and seen it. Lave it to me to know Phil Christian. +I've summered and wintered the man, haven't I? He's timber that doesn't +start, mother, blow high, blow low.” + +Kate heard another broken sound as of painful protest, and then with a +sickening sense she covered up her head that she might hear no more. + + + + +XII. + +She was weak and over-wrought, and she fell asleep as she lay covered. +While she slept a babel of meaningless voices kept clashing in her ears, +and her own voice haunted her perpetually. When she awoke it was +broad morning again, and the house was full of the smell of boiling +stock-fish. By that she knew it was another day, and the hour of early +breakfast. She heard the click of cups and saucers on the kitchen table, +the step of her father coming in from the mill, and then the heartsome +voice of Pete talking of the changes in the island since he went +away. New houses, promenades, iron piers, breakwaters, lakes, +towers--wonderful I extraordinary! tre-menjous! + +“But the boys--w here's the Manx boys at all?” said Pete. “Gone like a +flight of birds to Austrillya and Cleveland and the Cape, and I don't +know where. Not a Manx house now that hasn't one of the boys foreign. +And the houses themselves--where's the ould houses and the crofts? +Felled, all felled or boarded up. And the boats--where's the boats? +Lying rotting at the top of the harbour.” + +Grannie's step came into the kitchen, and Pete's loud voice drooped to a +whisper. “How's herself this morning, mother?” + +“Sleeping quiet and nice when I came downstairs,” said Grannie. + +“Will I be seeing her myself to-day, think you?” asked Pete. + +“I don't know in the world, but I'll ask,” answered Grannie. + +“You're an angel, Grannie,” said Pete, “a reg'lar ould archangel.” + +Kate shuddered with a new fear. It was clear that in the eyes of her +people the old relations with Pete were to stand. Everybody expected her +to marry Pete; everybody seemed anxious to push the marriage on. + +Grannie came up with her breakfast, pulled aside the blind, and opened +the window. + +“Nancy will tidy the room a taste,” she said coaxingly, “and then I +shouldn't wonder if you'll be sending for Pete.” + +Kate raised a cry of alarm. + +“Aw, no harm when a girl's poorly,” said Grannie, “and her promist man +for all.” + +Kate tried to protest and explain, but courage failed her. She only +said, “Not yet, mother. I'm not fit to see him yet.” + +“Say no more about it. Not to-day at all--to-morrow maybe,” said +Grannie, and Kate clutched at the word, and answered eagerly-- + +“Yes, tomorrow, mother; to-morrow maybe.” + +Before noon Philip had come again. Kate heard his horse's step on the +road, trotting hard from the direction of Peel. He drew up at the porch, +but did not alight, and Grannie went out to him. + +“I'll not come in to-day, Mrs. Cregeen,” he said. “Does she continue to +improve?” + +“As nice as nice, sir,” said Grannie. + +Kate crept out of bed, stole to the window, hid behind the curtains, and +listened intently. + +“What a mercy all goes well,” he said; Kate could hear the heaving of +his breath. “Is Pete about?” + +“No, but gone to Ramsey, sir,” said Grannie. “It's like you'll meet him +if you are going on to Ballure.” + +“I must be getting back to business,” said Philip, and the horse swirled +across the road. + +“Did you ride from Douglas on purpose, then?” said Grannie, and Philip +answered with an audible effort-- + +“I was anxious. What an escape she has had! I could scarcely sleep last +night for thinking of it.” + +Kate put her hand to her throat to keep back the cry that was bubbling +up, and her mother's voice came thick and deep. + +“The Lord's blessing. Master Philip----” she began, but the horse's feet +stamped out everything as it leapt to a gallop in going off. + +Kate listened where she knelt until the last beat of the hoofs had died +away in the distance, and then she crept back to bed and covered up her +head in the clothes as before, but with a storm of other feelings. “He +loves me,” she told herself with a thrill of the heart. “He loves +me--he loves me still! And he will never, never, never see me married to +anybody else.” + +She felt an immense relief now, and suddenly found strength to think of +facing Pete. It even occurred to her to send for him at once, as a first +step towards removing the impression that the old relations were to +remain. She would be quiet, she would be cold, she would show by her +manner that Pete was impossible, she would break the news gently. + +Pete came like the light at Nancy's summons. Kate heard him on the +stairs whispering with Nancy and breathing heavily. Nancy was hectoring +it over him and pulling him about to make him presentable. + +“Here,” whispered Nancy, “take the redyng comb and lash your hair out, +it's all through-others. And listen--you've got to be quiet. Promise +me you'll be quiet. She's wake and low and nervous, so no kissing. D'ye +hear me now, no kissing.” + +“Aw, kissing makes no noise to spake of, woman,” whispered Pete; and +then he was in the room. + +Kate saw him come, a towering dark figure between her and the door. He +did not speak at first, but slid down to the chair at the foot of the +bed, modestly, meekly, reverently, as if he had entered a sanctuary. His +hand rested on his knee, and she noticed that the wrist was hairy and +tattooed with the three legs of Man. + +“Is it you, Pete?” she asked; and then he said in a low tone, almost in +a whisper, as if speaking to himself in a hush of awe-- + +“It's her own voice again! I've heard it in my drames these five years.” + +He looked helplessly about him for a moment, fixed his watery eyes on +Nancy as if he wanted to burst into sobs but dare not for fear of the +noise, then turned on his chair and seemed on the point of taking to +flight. But just at that instant his dog, which had followed him into +the room, planted its forelegs on the counterpane and looked impudently +into Kate's face. + +“Down, Dempster, down!” cried Pete; and after that, the ice being broken +by the sound of his voice, Pete was his own man once more. + +“Is that your dog, Pete?” said Kate. + +“Aw, no, Kate, but I'm his man,” said Pete. “He does what he likes with +me, anyway. Caught me out in Kimber-ley and fetched me home.” + +“Is he old?” + +“Old, d'ye say? He's one of the lost ten tribes of dogs, and behaves as +if he'd got to inherit the earth.” + +She felt Pete's big black eyes shining on her. + +“My gracious, Kitty, what a woman you're growing, though!” he said. + +“Am I so much changed?” she asked. + +“Changed, is it?” he cried. “Gough bless me heart! the nice little +thing you were when we used to play fishermen together down at Cornaa +Harbour--d'ye remember? The ould kipper-box rolling on a block for +a boat at sea--do you mind it? Yourself houlding a bit of a broken +broomstick in the rope handle for a mast, and me working the +potato-dibber on the ground, first port and then starboard, for rudder +and wind and oar and tide. 'Mortal dirty weather this, cap'n?' 'Aw, yes, +woman, big sea extraordinary'--d'ye mind it, Kirry!” + +Kate tried to laugh a little and to say what a long time ago it was +since then. But Pete, being started, laughed uproariously, slapped his +knee, and rattled on. + +“Up at the mill, too--d'ye remember that now? Yourself with the top of +a barrel for a flower basket, holding it 'kimbo at your lil hip and +shouting, 'Violets! Swate violets! Fresh violets!'” (He mocked her +silvery treble in his lusty baritone and roared with laughter.) + +“And then me, woman, d'ye mind me?--me, with the pig-stye gate atop of +my head for a fish-board, yelling, 'Mackerel! Fine ladies, fresh ladies, +and bellies as big as bishops--Mack-er-el!' Aw, Kirry, Kirry! Aw, the +dear ould times gone by! Aw, the changes, the changes!... Did I _know_ +you then? Are you asking me did I know you when I found you in the glen? +Did I know I was alive, Kitty? Did I know the wind was howling? Did I +know my head was going round like a compass, and my heart thumping a +hundred and twenty pound to the square inch? Did I kiss you and kiss you +while you were lying there useless, and lift you up and hitch your poor +limp arms around my neck, and carry you out of the dirty ould tholthan +that was going to be the death of you--the first job I was doing on +the island, too, coming back to it.... Lord save us, Kitty, what have I +done?” + +Kate had dropped back on the pillow, and was sobbing as if her heart +would break, and seeing this, Nancy fell on Pete with loud reproaches, +took the man by the shoulders and his dog by the neck, and pushed both +out of the room. + +“Out of it,” cried Nancy. “Didn't I tell you to be quiet? You great +blethering omathaun, you shall come no more.” + +Abashed, ashamed, humiliated, and quiet enough now, Pete went slowly +down the stairs. + + + + +XIII. + +Late that night Kate heard Cæsar and her mother talking together as they +were going to bed. Cæsar was saying-- + +“I got him on the track of a good house, and he went off to Ramsey this +morning to put a sight on it.” + +“Dear heart alive, father!” Grannie answered, “Pete isn't home till a +week come Saturday.” + +“The young man is warm on the wedding,” said Cæsar, “and he has money, +and store is no sore.” + +“But the girl's not fit for it, 'deed she isn't,” said Grannie. + +“If she's wake,” said Cæsar, “shell be no worse for saying 'I will,' and +when she's said it she'll have time enough to get better.” + +Kate trembled with fear. The matter of her marriage with Pete was going +on without her. A sort of supernatural power seemed to be pushing it +along. Nobody asked if she wished it, nobody questioned that she did so. +It was taken for granted that the old relations would stand. As soon +as she could go about she would be expected to marry Pete. Pete himself +would expect it, because he believed he had her promise; her mother +would expect it, because she had always thought of it as a thing +understood; her father would expect it, because Pete's prosperity had +given him a new view of Pete's piety and pedigree; and Nancy Joe +would expect it, too, if only because she was still haunted by her old +bugbear, the dark shadow of Ross Christian. There was only one way to +break down these expectations, and that was to speak out. But how was a +girl to speak? What was she to say? + +Kate pretended to be ill. Three days longer she lay, like a hunted wolf +in its hole, keeping her bed from sheer dread of the consequences of +leaving it. The fourth day was Sunday. It was morning, and the church +bells were ringing. Cæsar had shouted from his bedroom for some one to +tie his bow, then for some one to button his black gloves. He had gone +off at length with the footsteps of the people stepping round to chapel. +The first hymn had been started, and its doleful notes were trailing +through the mill walls. Kate was propped up in bed, and the window of +her room was open. Over the droning of the hymn she caught the sound of +a horse's hoofs on the road. They stopped at a little distance, and then +came on again, with the same two voices as before. + +Pete was talking with great eagerness. “Plenty of house, aw plenty, +plenty,” he was saying. “Elm Cottage they're calling it--the slate +one with the ould fir-tree behind the Coort House and by the lane to +Claughbane. Dry as a bone and clane as a gull's wing. You could lie with +your back to the wall and ate off the floor. Taps inside and water as +white as gin. I've been buying the cabin of the 'Mona's Isle' for a +summer-house in the garden. Got a figurehead for the porch too, and +I'll have an anchor for the gate before I'm done. Aw, I'm bound to have +everything nice for her.” + +There was a short silence, in which nothing was heard but the step of +the horse, and then Philip said in a faltering voice, “But isn't this +being rather in a hurry, Pete?” + +“Short coorting's the best coorting, and ours has been long enough +anyway,” said Pete. They had drawn up at the porch, and Pete's laugh +came in at the window. + +“But think how weak she is,” said Philip. “She hasn't even-left her bed +yet, has she?” + +“Well, yes, of coorse, sartenly,” said Pete, in a steadier voice, “if +the girl isn't fit----” + +“It's so sudden, you see,” said Philip. “Has she--has she--consented?” + +“Not to say consented----” began Pete; and Philip took him up and said +quickly, eagerly, hotly-- + +“She can't--I'm sure she can't.” + +There was silence again, broken only by the horse's impatient pawing, +and then Philip said more calmly, “Let Dr. Mylechreest see her first, at +all events.” + +“I'm not a man for skinning the meadow to the sod, no----” said Pete, in +a doleful tone; but Kate heard no more. + +She was trembling with a new thought. It was only a shadowy suggestion +as yet, and at first she tried to beat it back. But it came again, it +forced itself upon her, it mastered her, she could not resist it. + +The way to break the fate that was pursuing her was to make _Philip_ +speak out! The way to stop the marriage with Pete was to compel Philip +to marry her! He thought she would never consent to marry Pete--what if +he were given to understand that she had consented. That was the way to +gain the victory over Philip, the way to punish him! + +He would not blame her--he would lay the blame at the door of chance, of +fate, of her people. He would think they were forcing this marriage upon +her--the mother out of love of Pete, the father out of love of Pete's +money, and Nancy out of fear of Ross Christian. He would know that she +could not struggle because she could not speak. He would believe she was +yielding against her will, in spite of her love, in the teeth of +their intention. He would think of her as a victim, as a martyr, as a +sacrifice. + +It was a deceit--a small deceit; it looked so harmless, too--so +innocent, almost humorous, half ridiculous; and she was a woman, and she +could not put it away. Love, love, love! It would be her excuse and her +forgiveness. She had appealed to Philip himself and in vain. Now she +would pretend to go on with her old relations. It was so little to do, +and the effects were so certain. In jealousy and in terror Philip would +step out of himself and claim her. + +She had craft--all hungry things have craft. She had inklings of +ambition, a certain love of luxury, and desire to be a lady. To +get Philip was to get everything. Love would be satisfied, ambition +fulfilled, the aims of refinement reached. Why not risk the great stake? + +Nancy came to tidy the room, and Kate said, “Where's Pete all this time, +I wonder?” + +“Sitting in the fire-seat this half-hour,” said Nancy. “I don't know in +the world what's come over the man. He's rocking and moaning there like +a cow licking a dead calf.” + +“Would he like to come up, think you?” + +“Don't ask the man twice if you want him to say no,” said Nancy. + +Blushing and stammering, and trying to straighten his black curls, Pete +came at Nancy's call. + +Kate had few qualms. The wound she had received from Philip had left her +conscienceless towards Pete. Yet she turned her head a little sideways +as she welcomed him. + +“Are you better, then, Kirry?” said Pete timidly. + +“I'm nearly as well as ever,” she answered. + +“You are, though?” said Pete. “Then you'll be down soon, it's like, eh?” + +“I hope so, Pete--quite soon.” + +“And fit for anything, now--yes?” + +“Oh, yes, fit for anything.” + +Pete laughed from his heart like a boy. “I'll take a slieu round to +Ballure and tell Philip immadiently.” + +“Philip?” said Kate, with a look of inquiry. + +“He was saying this morning you wouldn't be equal to it, Kirry.” + +“Equal to what, Pete?” + +“Getting--going--having--that's to say--well, you know, putting a sight +on the parson himself one of these days, that's the fact.” And, to cover +his confusion, Pete laughed till the scraas of the roof began to snip. + +There was a moment's pause, and then Kate said, with a cough and a +stammer and her head aside, “Is that so _very_ tiring, Pete?” + +Pete leapt from his chair and laughed again like a man demented. “D'ye +say so, Kitty? The word then, darling--the word in my ear--as soft as +soft----” + +He was leaning over the bed, but Kate drew away from him, and Nancy +pulled him back, saying, “Get off with you, you goosey gander! What for +should you bother a poor girl to know if sugar's sweet, and if she's +willing to change a sweetheart for a husband?” + +It was done. One act--nay, half an act; a word--nay, no word at all, but +only silence. The daring venture was afoot. + +Grannie came up with Kate's dinner that day, kissed her on both cheeks, +felt them hot, wagged her head wisely, and whispered, “I know--you +needn't tell _me!_” + + + + +XIV. + +The last hymn was sung, Cæsar came home from chapel, changed back +from his best to his work-day clothes, and then there was talking and +laughing in the kitchen amid the jingling of plates and the vigorous +rattling of knives and forks. + +“Phil must be my best man,” said Pete. “He'll be back to Douglas now, +but I'll get you to write me a line, Cæsar, and ask him.” + +“Do you hold with long engagements, Pete?” said Grannie. + +“A week,” said Pete, with the air of a judge; “not much less anyway--not +of a rule, you know.” + +“You goose,” cried Nancy, “it must be three Sundays for the banns.” + +“Then John the Clerk shall get them going this evening,” said Pete. +“Nancy had the pull of me there, Grannie. Not being in the habit of +getting married, I clane forgot about the banns.” + +John the Clerk came in the afternoon, and there was some lusty +disputation. + +“We must have bridesmaids and wedding-cakes, Pete--it's only proper,” + said Nancy. + +“Aw, yes, and tobacco and rum, and everything respectable,” said Pete. + +“And the parson--mind it's the parson now,” said Grannie; “none of their +nasty high-bailiffs. I don't know in the world how a dacent woman can +rest in her bed----” + +“Aw, the parson, of coorse--and the parson's wife, maybe,” said Pete. + +“I think I can manage it for you for to-morrow fortnight,” said John +the Clerk impressively, and there was some clapping of hands, quickly +suppressed by Cæsar, with mutterings of-- + +“Popery! clane Popery, sir! Can't a person commit matrimony without a +parson bothering a man?” + +Then Cæsar squared his elbows across the table and wrote the letter to +Philip. Pete never stood sponsor for anything so pious. + +“Respected and Honoured Sir,--I write first to thee that it hath been +borne in on my mind (strong to believe the Lord hath spoken) to marry on +Katherine Cregeen, only beloved daughter of Cæsar Cregeen, a respectable +man and a local preacher, in whose house I tarry, being free to use all +his means of grace. Wedding to-morrow fortnight at Kirk Christ, +Lezayre, eleven o'clock forenoon, and the Lord make it profitable to +my soul.--With love and-reverence, thy servant, and I trust the Lord's, +Peter Quilliam.” + +Having written this, Cæsar read it aloud with proper elevation of pitch. +Grannie wiped her eyes, and Pete said, “Indited beautiful, sir--only you +haven't asked him.” + +“My pen's getting crosslegs,” said Cæsar, “but that'll do for an N.B.” + +“N. B.--Will you come for my best man?” + +Then there was more talk and more laughter. “You're a lucky fellow, +Pete,” said Pete himself. “My sailor, you are, though. She's as sweet +as clover with the bumbees humming over it, and as warm as a gorse bush +when the summer's gone.” + +And then, affection being infectious beyond all maladies known to +mortals, Nancy Joe was heard to say, “I believe in my heart I must be +having a man myself before long, or I'll be losing the notion.” + +“D'ye hear that, boys?” shouted Pete. “Don't all spake at once.” + +“Too late--I've lost it,” said Nancy, and there was yet more laughter. + +To put an end to this frivolity, Cæsar raised a hymn, and they sang it +together with cheerful voices. Then Cæsar prayed appropriately, John the +Clerk improvised responses, and Pete went out and sat on the bottom +step in the lobby and smoked up the stairs, so that Kate in the bedroom +should not feel too lonely. + + + + +XV. + +Meanwhile Kate, overwhelmed with shame, humiliation, self-reproach, +horror of herself, and dread of everything, lay with cheeks ablaze and +her head buried in the bedclothes. She had no longer any need to pretend +to be sick; she was now sick in reality. Fate had threatened her. She +had challenged it. They were gambling together. The stake was her love, +her life, her doom. + +By the next day she had worked herself into a nervous fever. Dr. +Mylechreest came to see her, unbidden of the family. He was one of those +tall, bashful men who, in their eagerness to be gone, seem always to +have urgent business somewhere else. After a single glance at her and +a few muttered syllables, he went off hurriedly, as if some one were +waiting for him round the corner. But on going downstairs he met Cæsar, +who asked him how he found her. + +“Feverish, very; keep her in bed,” he answered. “As for this marriage, +it must be put off. She's exciting herself, and I won't answer for +the consequences. The thing has fallen too suddenly. To tell you the +truth--this way, Mr. Cregeen--I am afraid of a malady of the brain.” + +“Tut, tut, doctor,” said Cæsar. + +“Very well, if you know better. Good-day! But let the wedding wait. +_Traa dy liooar_--time enough, Mr. Cregeen. A right good Manx maxim for +once. Put it off--put it off!” + +“It's not my putting off, doctor. What can you do with a man that's +wanting to be married? You can't bridle a horse with pincers.” + +But when the doctor was gone, Cæsar said to Grannie, “Cut out the +bridesmaids and the wedding-cakes and the fiddles and the foolery, and +let the girl be married immadiently.” + +“Dear heart alive, father, what's all the hurry?” said Grannie. + +“And Lord bless my soul, what's all the fuss?” said Cæsar. “First +one objecting this, then another objecting that, as if everybody was +intarmined to stop the thing. It's going on, I'm telling you; d'ye hear +me? There's many a slip--but no matter. What's written with the pen +can't be cut out with the axe, so lave it alone, the lot of you.” + +Kate was in an ecstasy of exultation. The doctor had been sent by +Philip. It was Philip who was trying to stop the marriage. He would +never be able to bear it; he would claim her soon. It might be to-day, +it might be to-morrow, it might be the next day. The odds were with her. +Fate was being worsted. Thus she clung to her blind faith that Philip +would intervene. + +That was Monday, and on Tuesday morning Philip came again. He was very +quiet, but the heart has ears, and Kate heard him. Pete's letter had +reached him, and she could see his white face. After a few words of +commonplace conversation, he drew Pete out of the house. What had he got +to say? Was he thinking that Pete must be stopped at all hazards? Was +he about to make a clean breast of it? Was he going to tell all? +Impossible! He could not; he dared not; it was _her_ secret. + +Pete came back to the house alone, looking serious and even sad. Kate +heard him exchange a few words with her father as they passed through +the lobby to the kitchen. Cæsar was saying-- + +“Stand on your own head, sir, that's my advice to you.” + +In the intensity of her torment she could not rest. She sent for Pete. + +“What about Philip?” she said. “Is he coming? What has he been telling +you?” + +“Bad news, Kate--very bad,” said Pete. + +There was a fearful silence for a moment. It was like the awful hush +at the instant when the tide turns, and you feel as if something has +happened to the world. Then Kate hardened her face and said, “What is +it?” + +“He's ill, and wants to go away in a week. He can't come to the +wedding,'' said Pete. + +“Is that all?” said Kate. Her heart leapt for joy. She could not help +it--she laughed. She saw through Philip's excuse. It was only his +subterfuge--he thought Pete would not marry without him. + +“Aw, but you never seen the like, though, Kirry,” said Pete; “he was +that white and wake and narvous. Work and worry, that's the size of it. +There's nothing done in this world without paying the price of it, and +that's as true as gospel. 'The sea's calling me, Pete,' says he, and +then he laughed, but it was the same as if a ghost itself was grinning.” + +In the selfishness of her enfeebled spirit, Kate still rejoiced. Philip +was suffering. It was another assurance that he would come to her +relief. + +“When does he go?” she asked. + +“On Tuesday,” answered Pete. + +“Isn't there a way of getting a Bishop's license to marry in a week?” + said Kate. + +“But will you, though?” said Pete, with a shout of joy. + +“Ask Philip first. No use changing if Philip can't come.” + +“He shall--he must. I won't take No.” + +“You may kiss me now,” said Kate, and Pete plucked her up into his arms +and kissed her. + +She was heart-dead to him yet, from the wound that Philip had dealt her, +but at the touch of his lips a feeling of horror seemed to cramp all her +limbs. With a shudder she crept down in the bed and hid her face, hating +herself, loathing herself, wishing herself dead. + +He stood a moment by her side, crying like a big boy in his great +happiness. “I don't know in the world what she sees in me to be so fond +of me, but that's the way with the women always, God bless them!” + +She did not lift her face, and he stepped quietly to the door. Half-way +through he turned about and raised one arm over his head. “God's rest +and God's peace be with you, and may the man that gets you keep a clane +heart and a clane hand, and be fit for the good woman he's won for his +wife.” + +At the next minute he went tearing down the stairs, and the kitchen rang +with his laughter. + + + + +XVI. + +Fate scored one. Kate had been telling herself that Philip was tired of +her, that he did not love her any longer, that having taken all he could +take he desired to be done with her, that he was trying to forget her, +and that she was a drag upon him, when suddenly she remembered the +tholthan, and bethought herself for the first time of a possible +contingency. Why had she not thought of it before? Why had _he_ never +thought of it? _If_ it should come to pass! The prospect did not appal +her; it did not overwhelm her with confusion or oppress her with shame; +it did not threaten to fall like a thunderbolt; the thought of it came +down like an angel's whisper. + +She was not afraid. It was only an idea, only a possibility, only a +dream of consequences, but at one bound it brought her so much nearer to +Philip. It gave her a right to him. How dare he make her suffer so? She +would not permit him to leave her. He was her husband, and he must +cling to her, come what would. Across the void that had divided them +a mysterious power drew them together. She was he, and he was she, and +they were one, for--who knows?--who could say?--perhaps Nature herself +had willed it. + +Thus the first effect of the new thought upon Kate was frenzied +exultation. She had only one thing to do now. She had only to go +to Philip as Bathsheba went to David. True, she could not say what +Bathsheba said. She had no certainty, but her case was no less strong. +“Have you never thought of what may possibly occur?” This is what she +would say now to Philip. And Philip would say to her, “Dearest, I have +never thought of that. Where was my head that I never reflected?” Then, +in spite of his plans, in spite of his pledge to Pete, in spite of the +world, in spite of himself--yea, in spite of his own soul if it stood +between them--he would cling to her; she was sure of it--she could swear +to it--he could not resist. + +“He will believe whatever I tell him,” she thought, and she would say, +“Come to me, Philip; I am frightened.” In the torture of her palpitating +heart she would have rejoiced at that moment if she could have been sure +that she was in the position of what the world calls a shameful woman. +With that for her claim she could see herself going to Philip and +telling him, her head on his breast, whispering sweetly the great +secret--the wondrous news. And then the joy, the rapture, the long kiss +of love! “Mine, mine, mine! he is mine at last!” + +That could not be quite so; she was not so happy as Bathsheba; she was +not sure, but her right was the same for all that. Oh, it was joyful, it +was delicious! + +The little cunning arts of her sex, the small deceits in which she had +disguised herself fell away from her now. She said to herself, “I will +stop the nonsense about the marriage with Pete.” It was mean, it was +foolish, it was miserable trifling, it was wicked, it was a waste +of life--above all, it was doing a great, great wrong to her love of +Philip! How could she ever have thought of it? + +Next morning she was up and was dressing when Grannie came into the room +with a cup of tea. “I feel so much better,” she said “that I think I'll +go to Douglas by the coach today, mother.” + +“Do, bogh,” said Grannie cheerfully, “and Pete shall go with you.” + +“Oh, no; I must be quite alone, mother.” + +“Aw, aw! A lil errand, maybe! Shopping is it? Presents, eh? Take your +tay, then.” And Grannie rolled the blind, saying, “A beautiful morning +you'll have for it, too. I can see the spire as plain as plain.” Then, +turning about, “Did you hear the bells this morning, Kitty?” + +“Why, what bells, mammy?” said Kate, through a mouthful of bread and +butter. + +“The bells for Christian Killip. Her old sweetheart took her to church +at last. He wouldn't get rest at your father till he did--and her baby +two years for Christmas. But what d'ye think, now? Robbie left her at +the church door, and he's off by the Ramsey packet for England. Aw, +dear, he did, though. 'You can make me marry her,' said he, 'but you +can't make me live with her,' he said, and he was away down the road +like the dust.” + +“I don't think I'll go to Douglas to-day, mother,” said Kate in a broken +voice. “I'm not so very well, after all.” + +“Aw, the bogh!” said Grannie. “Making too sure of herself, was she? It's +the way with them all when they're mending.” + +With cheerful protestations Grannie helped her back to bed, and then +went off with an anxious face to tell Cæsar that she was more ill than +ever. + +She was ill indeed; but her worst illness was of the heart. “If I go to +him and tell him,” she thought, “he will marry me--yes. No fear that he +will leave me at the church door or elsewhere. He will stay with me. We +will be man and wife to the last. The world will know nothing. But _I_ +will know. As long as I live I will remember that he only sacrificed +himself to repair a fault That shall never be--never, never!” + +Cæsar came up in great alarm. He seemed to be living in hourly dread +that some obstacle would arise at the last moment to stop the marriage. +“Chut, woman!” he said play-. fully. “Have a good heart, Kitty. The +sun's not going down on you yet at all.” + +That night there were loud voices from the bar-room. The talk was of the +marriage which had taken place in the morning, and of its strange and +painful sequel. John the Clerk was saying, “But you'd be hearing of the +by-child, it's like?” + +“Never a word,” said somebody. + +“Not heard of it, though? Fetching the child to the wedding to have the +bad name taken off it--no? They were standing the lil bogh---it's only +three--two is it, Grannie, only two?--well, they were standing the lil +thing under its mother's perricut while the sarvice was saying.” + +“You don't say!” + +“Aw, truth enough, sir! It's the ould Manx way of legitimating. The +parsons are knowing nothing of it, but I've seen it times.” + +“John's right,” said Mr. Jelly; “and I can tell you more--it was just +_that_ the man went to church for.” + +“Wouldn't trust,” said John the Clerk. “The woman wasn't getting much of +a husband out of it anyway.” + +“No,” said Pete--he had not spoken before--“but the child was getting +the name of its father, though.” + +“That's not mountains of thick porridge, sir,” said somebody. “Bobbie's +gone. What's the good of a father if he's doing nothing to bring you +up?” + +“Ask your son if you've got any of the sort,” said Pete; “some of you +have. Ask me. I know middling well what it is to go through the world +without a father's name to my back. If your lad is like myself, he's +knowing it early and he's knowing it late. He's knowing it when he's +saying his bits of prayers atop of the bed in the gable loft: 'God bless +mother--and grandmother,' maybe--there's never no 'father' in his little +texes. And he's knowing it when he's growing up to a lump of a lad and +going for a trade, and the beast of life is getting the grip of him. Ten +to one he comes to be a waistrel then, and, if it's a girl instead, a +hundred to nothing she turns out a--well, worse. Only a notion, is +it? Just a parzon's lie, eh? Having your father's name is nothing--no? +That's what the man says. But ask the _child_, and shut your mouth for a +fool.” + +There was a hush and a hum after that, and Kate, who had reached from +the bed to open the door, clutched it with a feverish grasp. + +“But Christian Killip is nothing but a trollop, anyway, sir,” said +Cæsar. + +“Every cat is black in the night, father--the girl's in trouble,” said +Pete. “No, no! If I'd done wrong by a woman, and she was having a child +by me, I'd marry her if she'd take me, though I'd come to hate her like +sin itself.” + +Grannie in the kitchen was wiping her eyes at these brave words, but +Kate in the bedroom was tossing in a delirium of wrath. “Never, never, +never!” she thought. + +Oh, yes, Philip would marry her if she imposed herself upon him, if she +hinted at a possible contingency. He, too, was a brave man; he also had +a lofty soul--he would not shrink. But no, not for the wealth of worlds. + +Philip loved her, and his love alone should bring him to her side. No +other compulsion should be put upon him, neither the thought of her +possible future position, nor of the consequences to another. It was the +only justice, the only safety, the only happiness now or in the time to +come. + +“He shall marry me for _my_ sake,” she thought, “for my own sake--my own +sake only.” + +Thus in the wild disorder of her soul--the tempest of conflicting +passions--her pride barred up the one great way. + + + + +XVII. + +There was no help for it after all--she must go on as she had begun, +with the old scheme, the old chance, the old gambling hazard. Heart-sick +and ashamed, waiting for Philip, and listening to every step, she kept +her room two days longer. Then Cæsar came and rallied her. + +“Gough bless me, but nobody will credit it,” he said. “The marriage +for Monday, and the bride in bed a Wednesday. People will say it isn't +coming off at all.” + +This alarmed her. It partly explained why Philip did not come. If he +thought there was no danger of the marriage, he would be in no hurry to +intervene. Next day (Thursday) she struggled up and dressed in a light +wrapper, feeling weak and nervous, and looking pale and white like +apple-blossom nipped by frost. Pete would have carried her downstairs, +but she would not have it. They established her among a pile of cushions +before a fire in the parlour, with its bowl of sea-birds' eggs that had +the faint, unfamiliar smell--its tables of old china that shook and rang +slightly with every step and sound. The kitchen was covered with the +litter of dressmakers preparing for the wedding. There were bodices +to try on, and decisions to give on points of style. Kate agreed to +everything. In a weak and toneless voice she kept on telling them to do +as they thought hest. Only when she heard that Pete was to pay did she +assert her will, and that was to limit the dresses to one. + +“Sakes alive now, Kirry,” cried Nancy, “that's what I call ruining a +good husband--the man was willing to buy frocks for a boarding-school.” + +Pete came, sat on a stool at her feet, and told stories. They were +funny stories of his life abroad, and now and again there came bursts +of laughter from the kitchen, where they were straining their necks to +catch his words through the doors, which they kept ajar. But Kate hardly +listened. She showed signs of impatience sometimes, and made quick +glances around when the door opened, as if expecting somebody. On +recovering herself at these moments, she found Pete looking up at her +with the big, serious, moist eyes of a dog. + +He began to tell of the house he had taken, to excuse himself for not +consulting her, and to describe the progress of the furnishing. + +“I've put it all in the hands of Cannell & Quayle, Kitty,” he said, “and +they're doing it beautiful. Marble slabs, bless you, like a butcher's +counter; carpets as soft as daisies, and looking-glasses as tall as a +man.” + +Kate had not heard him. She was trying to remember all she knew of the +courts of the island--where they were held, and on what days. + +“Have you seen Philip lately?” she asked. + +“Not since Monday,” said Pete. “He's in Douglas, working like mad to be +here on Monday, God bless him!” + +“What did he say when he heard we had changed the day?” + +“Wanted to get out of it first. 'I'm sailing on Tuesday,' said he.” + +“Did you tell him that _I_ proposed it?” + +“Trust me for not forgetting that at all. 'Aw, then,' says he, 'there's +no choice left,' he says.” + +Kate's pale face became paler, the dark circles about her eyes grew yet +more dark. “I think I'll go back to bed, mother,” she said in the same +toneless voice. + +Pete helped her to the foot of the stairs. The big, moist eyes +were looking at her constantly. She found it hard to keep an equal +countenance. + +“But will you be fit for it, darling?” said Pete. + +“Why, of course she'll be fit, sir,” said Cæsar. “What girl is ever more +than middling the week before she's married?” + +Next day she persuaded her father to take her to Douglas. She had little +errands there that could not be done in Ramsey. The morning was fine but +cold. Pete helped her up in the gig, and they drove away. If only she +could see Philip, if only Philip could see her, he would know by +the look of her face that the marriage was not of her making--that +compulsion of some sort was being put on her. She spent four hours +going from shop to shop, lingering in the streets, but seeing nothing +of Philip. Her step was slow and weary, her features were pinched and +starved, but Cæsar could scarcely get her out of the town. At length the +daylight began to fail, and then she yielded to his importunities. + +“How short the days are now,” she said with a sigh, as they ran into the +country. + +“Yes, they are a cock's stride shorter in September,” said Cæsar; “but +when a woman once gets shopping, Midsummer day itself won't do--she's +wanting the land of the midnight sun.” + +Pete lifted her out of the gig in darkness at the door of the “Fairy,” + and, his great arms being about her, he carried her into the house and +set her down in the fire-seat. She would have struggled to her feet if +she had been able; she felt something like repulsion at his touch; but +he looked at her with the mute eloquence of love, and she was ashamed. + +The house was full of gossips that night. They talked of the marriage +customs of old times. One described the “pay-weddings,” where the hat +went round, and every guest gave something towards the cost of the +breakfast and the expenses of beginning housekeeping--rude forefather +of the practice of the modern wedding present. Another pictured the +irregular marriages made in public-houses in the days when the island +had three breweries and thirty drinking shops to every thousand of its +inhabitants. The publican laid two sticks crosswise on the floor, and +said to the bride and bridegroom-- + +“Hop over the sticks and lie crossed on the floor, And you're man and +wife for nevermore.” + +There was some laughter at this, but Kate sat in the fire-seat and +sipped her tea in silence, and Pete said quietly, “Nothing to laugh at, +though. I remember a girl over Foxal way that was married to a man like +that, and then he went off to Kinsale, and got kept for the herring +riots--d'ye mind them? She was a strapping girl, though, and when the +man was gone the boys came bothering her, first one and then another, +and good ones among them too. And honour bright for all, they were for +taking her to the parzon about right But no! Did they think she was for +committing beggamy? She was married to one man, and wasn't that enough +for a dacent girl anyway. And so she wouldn't and she didn't, and last +of all her own boy came back, and they lived together man and wife, and +what for shouldn't they?” + +This question from the man who was on the point of going to church was +received with shouts of laughter, through which the voice of Grannie +rose in affectionate remonstrance, saying, “Aw, Pete, it's ter'ble to +hear you, bogh.” + +“What's there ter'ble about that, Grannie?” said Pete. “Isn't it the +Almighty and not the parzon that makes the marriage?” + +“Aw, boy veen, boy veen,” cried Grannie, “you was used to be a good man, +but you have fell off very bad.” + +Kate was in a fever of eagerness. She wanted to open her heart to Pete, +to beg him to spare her, to tell him that it was impossible that they +should ever marry. Pete would see that Philip was her husband by every +true law, human and divine. In this mood she lived through much of the +following day, Friday, tossing and turning in bed, for the exhaustion of +the day in Douglas had confined her to her room again. + +In the evening she came downstairs, and was established in the fire-seat +as before. There were four or five old women in the kitchen spinning +yarn for a set of blankets which Grannie intended for a wedding present. +“When the day's work was nearly done, two or three old men, the old +husbands of the old women, came to carry their wheels home again. Then, +as the wheels whirred for the last of the twist, Pete set the old crones +to tell stories of old times. + +“Tell us of the days when you were young, Anne,” said Pete to an ancient +dame of eighty. Her husband of eighty-four sat sucking his pipe by her +side. + +“Well,” said old Anne, stretching her arms to the yarn, “I was as near +going foreign, same as yourself, sir, just as near, now, as makes no +matter. It was the very day I married this man, and his brother was +making a start for Austrillya. Jemmy was my ould sweetheart, only I had +given him up because he was always stealing my pocket-handkerchers. But +he came that morning and tapped at my window, and 'Will you come, Anne?' +says he, and I whipped on my perricut and stole out and down to the quay +with him. But my heart was losing me when I saw the white horses on the +water, and home I came and went to church with this one instead.” + +While old Anne told her story her old husband opened his mouth wider and +wider, until the pipe-shank dropped out of his toothless gums on to his +waistcoat. Then he stretched his left arm and brought down his clenched +hand with a bang on to her shoulder. + +“And have you been living with me better than sixty years,” said he, +“and never telling me that before?” + +Pete tried to pacify his ancient jealousy, but it was not to be +appeased, and he shouldered the wheel and hobbled off, saying, “And I +sent out two pound five to put a stone on the man's grave!” + +There was loud laughter when the old couple were gone, but Pete said, +nevertheless, “A sacret's a sacret, though, and the ould lady had no +right to tell it. It was the dead man's sacret too, and she's fouled the +ould man's memory. If a person's done wrong, the best thing he can do +next is to say darned little about it.” + +Kate rose and went off to bed. Another door had been barred to her, and +she felt sick and faint. + + + + +XVIII. + +The next day was Saturday. Kate remembered that Philip came to Ballure +on Saturdays. She felt sure that he would come to Sulby also. Let him +only set eyes on her, and he would divine the trouble that had taken the +colour out of her cheeks. Then he would speak to Pete and to her father; +he would deliver her; he would take everything upon himself. Thus all +day long, like a white-eyed gambler who has staked his last, she waited +and listened and watched. At breakfast she said to herself, “He will +come this morning.” At dinner, “He will come this evening.” At supper, +“He will come tonight.” + +But Philip did not come, and she grew hysterical as well as restless. +She watched the clock; the minutes passed with feet of lead, but the +hours with wings of fire. She was now like a criminal looking for a +reprieve. Every time the clock warned to strike, she felt one hour +nearer her doom. + +The strain was wearing her out. She reproached Philip for leaving her to +this cruel uncertainty, and she suffered the pangs of one who tries +at the same time to love and to hate. Then she reproached herself with +altering the date of the marriage, and excused Philip on the grounds of +her haste. She felt like a witch who was burning by her own spell. Hope +was failing her, and Will was breaking down as well. Nevertheless, she +determined that the wedding should be postponed. + +That was on Saturday night. On Sunday morning she had gone one step +farther. The last pitiful shred of expectation that Philip would +intervene seemed then to be lost, and she had resolved that, come +what would, she should not marry at all. No need to appeal to Pete; no +necessity to betray the secret of Philip. All she had to do was to +say she would not go on with the wedding, and no power on earth should +compel her. + +With this determination, and a feeling of immense relief, she went +downstairs. Cæsar was coming in from the preaching-room, and Pete from +the new house at Ramsey. They sat down to dinner. After dinner she would +speak out. Cæsar sharpened the carving-knife on the steel, and said, +“We've taken the girl Christian Killip back to communion to-day.” + +“Poor thing,” said Grannie, “pity she was ever put out of it, though.” + +“Maybe so,--maybe no,” said Cæsar. “Necessary anyway; one scabby sheep +infects the flock.” + +“And has marriage daubed grace on the poor sheep's sore then, Cæsar?” + said Pete. + +“She's Mistress Robbie Teare and a dacent woman, sir,” said Cæsar, +digging into the beef, “and that's all the truck a Christian church has +got with it.” + +Kate did not eat her dinner that day, and neither did she speak out as +she had intended. A supernatural power seemed to have come down at the +last moment and barred up the one remaining pathway of escape. She was +in the track of the storm. The tempest was ready to fall on her. Where +could she fly for shelter? + +What her father had said of the girl had revealed her life to her in the +light of her relation to Philip. The thought of the possible contingency +which she had foreseen with so much joy, as so much power, had awakened +the consciousness of her moral position. She was a fallen woman! What +else was she? And if the contingency befell, what would become of her? +In the intensity of her father's pietistic views the very shadow of +shame would overwhelm his household, overthrow his sect, and uproot +his religious pretensions. Kate trembled at the possibility of such a +disaster coming through her. She saw herself being driven from house and +home. Where could she fly? And though she fled away, would she not still +be the cause of sorrow and disgrace to all whom she left behind--her +mother, her father, Pete, everybody? + +If she could only tear out the past, at least she could stop this +marriage. Or if she had been a man she could stop it, for a man may sin +and still look to the future with a firm face. But she was a woman, and +a woman's acts may be her own, but their consequences are beyond her. +Oh, the misery of being a woman! She asked herself what she could do, +and there was no answer. She could not break the web of circumstances. +Her situation might be false, it might be dishonourable, but there was +no escape from it. There was no gleam of hope anywhere. + +Late that night--Sunday night--they were sitting together in the +kitchen, Kate in the fire-seat as usual, Pete on the stool by the turf +closet, smoking up the chimney, Cæsar reading aloud, Grannie listening, +and Nancy cooking the supper, when the porch door burst open and +somebody entered. Kate rose to her feet with a startled cry of joy, +looked round eagerly, and then sat down again covered with confusion. + +It was the girl Christian Killip, a pale, weak, frightened creature, +with the mouth and eyes of a hare. + +“Is Mr. Quilliam here?” she asked. + +“Here's the man himself, Christian,” said Grannie. “What do you want +with him?” + +“Oh, God bless you, sir,” said the girl to Pete, “God bless you for ever +and ever.” + +Then turning back to Grannie, she explained in woman's fashion, with +many words, that somebody unknown had sent her twenty pounds, for the +child, by post, the day before, and she had only now guessed who it must +be when John the Clerk had told her what Pete had said a week before. + +Pete grunted and glimed, smoked up the chimney, and said, “That'll do, +ma'am, that'll do. Don't believe all you hear. John says more than his +Amens, anyway.” + +“I'm axing your pardon, miss,” said the girl to Kate, “but I couldn't +help coming--I couldn't really--no, I couldn't,” and then she began to +cry. + +“Where's that child?” said Pete, heaving up to his feet with a ferocious +look. “What! you mane to say you've left the lil thing alone, asleep? Go +back to it then immajent. Good night!” + +“Good night, sir, and God bless you, and when you're married to-morrow, +God bless your wife as well!” + +“That'll do--that'll do,” said Pete, backing her to the porch. + +“You desarve a good woman, sir, and may the Lord be good to you both.” + +“Tut! tut!” said Pete, and he tut-tutted her out of the house. + +She smoothed her baby's hair more tenderly than ever that night, and +kissed it again and again. + +Kate could scarcely breathe, she could barely see. Her pride and her +will had broken down utterly. This greathearted man loved her. He would +lay down his life if need be to save her. To morrow he would marry her. +Here, then, was her rock of refuge--this strong man by her side. + +She could struggle against fate no longer. It's invisible hand was +pushing her on. It's blind power was dragging her. If Philip would not +come to claim her she must marry Pete. + +And Pete? She meant no harm to Pete. She had not yet thought of things +from Pete's point of view. He was like the camel-bag in the desert to +the terrified wayfarer when the sand-cloud breaks oyer him. He flies to +it. It shelters him. But what of the camel itself, with its head in the +storm? Until the storm is over he does not think of that. + + + + +XIX. + +Meantime Philip himself was in the throes of his own agony. At the news +of Kate's illness he was overwhelmed with remorse, and when he inquired +if she had been delirious, he was oppressed with a sense of meanness +never felt before. At his meeting with Pete he realised for the first +time to what depths his duplicity had degraded him. He had prided +himself on being a man of honour, and he was suddenly thrown out of the +paths in which he could walk honourably. + +When the first shock of Kate's disaster was over, he remembered the +interview with the Governor. The Deemstership burnt in his mind with +a growing fever of desire, but he did not apply for it. He did not +even mention it to Auntie Nan. She heard of his prospects from Peter +Christian Balla-whaine, who first set foot in her house on this errand +of congratulation. The sweet old soul was wildly excited. All the hopes +of her life were about to be realised, the visions and the dreams were +coming true. Philip was going to regain what his father had lost. Had he +made his application yet? No? He would, though; it was his duty. + +But Philip could not apply for the Deemstership. To sit down in cold +blood and write to the Home Secretary while Kate was lying sick in bed +would be too much like asking the devil's wages for sacrificing her. +Then came Pete with his talk of the wedding. That did not really alarm +him. It was only the last revolution of the old wheel that had been set +spinning before Pete went away. Kate would not consent. They had taken +her consent for granted. He felt easy, calm, and secure. + +Next came his old master, the college friend of his father, now promoted +to the position of Clerk of the Polls. He was proud of his pupil, and +had learnt that Philip was first favourite with the Governor. + +“I always knew it,” he said. “I did, ma'am, I did. The first time I set +eyes on him, thinks I, 'Here comes the makings of the best lawyer in the +island,' and by ------ he's not going to disappoint me either.” + +The good fellow was a noisy, hearty, robustious creature, a bachelor, +and when talking of the late Deemster, he said women were usually the +chief obstacles in a man's career. Then he begged Auntie Nan's pardon, +but the old lady showed no anger. She agreed that it had been so in some +cases. Young men should be careful what stumbling-blocks they set up in +the way of their own progress. + +Philip listened in silence, and was conscious, through all the unselfish +counselling, of a certain cynical bitterness. Still he did not make +application for the Deemstership. Then came Cæsar's letter announcing +the marriage, and even fixing a date for it. This threw him into a fit +of towering indignation. He was certain of undue pressure. They were +forcing the girl. It was his duty to stop the marriage. But how? There +was one clear course, but that course he could not take. He could not go +back on his settled determination that he must not, should not marry the +girl himself. Only one thing was left--to rely on Kate. She would never +consent. Not being able to marry _him_, she would marry no man. She +would do as he was doing--she would suffer and stand alone. + +By this time Philip's love, which, in spite of himself, had grown cool +since the Melliah, and in his fierce battle with his worldly aims, +suddenly awakened to fresh violence at the approach of another man. But +his ambition fought with his love, and he began to ask himself if it +made, any difference after all in this matter of Kate whether he took +the Deemstership or left it. Kate was recovering; he had nothing to +reproach himself with, and it would be folly to sacrifice the ambition +of a lifetime to the love of a woman who could never be his, a woman he +could never marry. At that he wrote his letter to the Home Secretary. +It was a brilliant letter of its kind, simple, natural, strong, and +judicious. He had a calm assurance that nothing so good would leave the +island, yet he could not bring himself to post it. Some quiverings of +the old tenderness came back as he held it in his hand, some visions of +Kate, with her twitching lips, her passionate eyes, some whisperings of +their smothered love. + +Then came Pete again with the decisive blow. Kate _had_ consented. There +was no longer any room for doubt. His former indignation seemed almost +comic, his confidence absurd. Kate was willing to marry Pete, and after +all, what right had he to blame her? What right had he to stop the +marriage? He had wronged the girl enough already. A good man came and +offered her his love. She was going to take it. How should he dare to +stop her from marrying another, being unable to marry her himself? + +That night he posted his letter to the Home Secretary, and calmed the +gnawings of his love with dreams of ambition. He would regain the place +of his father; he would revive the traditions of his grandfather; the +Christians should resume their ancient standing in the Isle of Man; the +last of their race should be a strong man and a just one. No, he would +never marry; he would live alone, a quiet life, a peaceful one, slightly +tinged with melancholy, yet not altogether unhappy, not without cheer. + +Under all other emotions, strengthening and supporting him, was a secret +bitterness towards Kate--a certain contempt of her fickleness, her +lightness, her shallow love, her readiness to be off with the old love +and on with the new. There was a sort of pride in his own higher type of +devotion, his sterner passion. Pete invited him to the wedding, but he +would not go, he would invent some excuse. + +Then came the change of the day to suit his supposed convenience, and +also Kate's own invitation. Very well, be it so. Kate was defying him. +Her invitation was a challenge. He would take it; he would go to the +wedding. And if their eyes should meet, he knew whose eyes must fall. + + + + +XX. + +Early next day the sleeping morning was awakened by the sound of a horn. +It began somewhere in the village, wandered down the glen, crossed the +bridge, plodded over the fields, and finally coiled round the house of +the bride in thickening groans of discord. This restless spirit in the +grey light was meant as herald of the approaching wedding. It came from +the husky lungs of Mr. Jonaique Jelly. + +Before daylight “The Manx Fairy” was already astir. Somewhere in the +early reaches of the dawn the house had its last dusting down at the +hands of Nancy Joe. Then Grannie finished, on hearth and griddle, the +baking of her cakes. After that, some of the neighbours came and carried +off to their own fires the beef, mutton, chickens, and ducks intended +for the day's dinner. It was woman's work that was to the fore, and all +idle men were hustled out of the way. + +Towards nine o'clock breakfast was swallowed standing. Then everybody +began to think of dressing. In this matter the men had to be finished +off before the women could begin. Already they were heard bellowing for +help from unseen regions upstairs. Grannie took Cæsar in hand. Pete was +in charge of Nancy Joe. + +It was found at the last moment that Pete had forgotten to provide +himself with a white shirt. He had nothing to be married in except the +flannel one in which he came home from Africa. This would never do. It +wasn't proper, it wasn't respectable. There was no choice but to borrow +a shirt of Cæsar's. Cæsar's shirt was of ancient pattern, and Pete was +shy of taking it. “Take it, or you'll have none,” said Nancy, and she +pushed him back into his room. When he emerged from it he walked with +a stiff neck down the stairs in a collar that reached to his ears at +either side, and stood out at his cheeks like the wings of a white bat, +with two long sharp points on the level of his eyes, which he seemed to +be watching warily to avoid the stab of their ironed starch. At the +same moment Cæsar appeared in duck trousers, a flowered waistcoat, a +swallow-tail coat, and a tall hat of rough black beaver. + +The kitchen was full of men and women by this time, and groups of young +fellows were gathered on the road outside, some with horses, saddled and +bridled for the bride's race home after the ceremony; others with guns +ready loaded for firing as the procession appeared; and others again +with lines of print handkerchiefs, which, as substitutes for flags, they +were hanging from tree to tree. + +At every moment the crowd became greater outside, and the company inside +more dense. John the Clerk called on his way to church, and whispered +Pete that everything was ready, and they were going to sing a beautiful +psalm. + +“It isn't many a man's wedding I would be taking the same trouble with,” + said John. “When you are coming down the alley give a sight up, sir, and +you'll see me.” + +“He's only a poor thing,” said Mr. Jelly in Pete's ear as John the Clerk +went off. “No more music in the man than my ould sow. Did you hear the +horn this morning, sir? Never got up so early for a wedding before. I'll +be giving you 'the Black and the Grey' going into the church.” + +Grannie came down in a gigantic bonnet like a half-moon, with her white +cap visible beneath it; and Nancy Joe appeared behind her, be-ribboned +out of all recognition, and taller by many inches for the turret of +feathers and flowers on the head that was usually bare. + +Then the church bells began to peal, and Cæsar made a prolonged A--hm! +and said in a large way, “Has the carriage arrived?” + +“It's coming over by the bridge now,” said somebody at the door, and at +the next moment a covered wagonette drew up at the porch. + +“All ready?” asked Cæsar. + +“Stop, sir,” said Pete, and then, turning to Nancy Joe, “Is it glad a +man should be on his wedding-day, Nancy?” + +“Why, of coorse, you goose. What else?” she answered. + +“Well, no man can be glad in a shirt like this,” said Pete; “I'm going +back to take it off.” + +Two minutes afterwards he reappeared in his flannel one, under his suit +of blue pilot, looking simple and natural, and a man every inch of him. + +“Now call the bride,” said Cæsar. + + + + +XXI. + +Kate had been kept awake during the dark hours with a sound in her ears +that was like the measured ringing of far-off bells. When the daylight +came she slept a troubled sleep, and when she awoke she had a sense of +stupefaction, as if she had taken a drug, and was not yet recovered from +the effects of it. Nancy came bouncing into her room and crying, “It's +your wedding-day, Kitty!” She answered by repeating mechanically, “It's +your wedding day, Kitty.” + +There was an expression of serenity on her face; she even smiled a +little. A sort of vague gaiety came over her, such as comes to one who +has watched long in agony and suspense by the bed of a sick person and +the person is dead. Nancy drew the little window curtain aside, stooped +down, and looked out and said, “'Happy the bride the sun shines on' +they're saying, and look! the sun is shining.” + +“Oh, but the sun is an old sly-boots,” she answered. + +They came up to dress her. She kept stumbling against things, and then +laughing in a faint way. The dress was the new one, and when they had +put it on they stood back from her and shouted with delight. She took up +the little broken hand-glass to look at herself. Her great eyes sparkled +piteously. + +The church bells began to ring her wedding-peal. She had to listen hard +to hear it. All sounds seemed to be very far away; everything looked a +long way off. She was living in a sort of dead white dawn of thought and +feeling. + +At last they came to say the coach was ready and everything was waiting +for the bride. She repeated their message like a machine, made a slow +gesture, and followed them downstairs. When she got near to the bottom, +she looked around on the faces below as if expecting to see somebody. +Just then her father was saying, “Mr. Christian is to meet us at the +church.” + +She smiled faintly and answered the people's greetings in an indistinct +tone. There was some indulgent whispering at sight of her pale face. +“Pale but genteel,” said some one, and then Nancy reached over and drew +the bride's veil down over her face. + +At the next minute she was outside the house, standing at the back of +the wagonette. The coachman, with his white rosette, was holding the +door open on one side, and her father was elevating her hand on the +other. + +“Am I to go, then?” she asked in a helpless voice. + +“Well, what do _you_ think?” said Cæsar. “Shall the man slip off and get +married to himself, think you?” + +There was laughter among the people standing round, and she laughed also +and stepped into the coach. Her mother followed her, crinkling in noisy +old silk, and Nancy Joe came next, smelling of lavender and hair-oil. +Then her father got in, and then Pete, with his great warm presence. + +A salute of six guns was fired straight up by the coach-windows. The +horses pranced, Nancy screamed, and Grannie started, but Kate gave no +sign. People were closing round the coach-door and shouting altogether +as at a fair. “Good luck to you, boy. Good luck! Good luck!” Pete was +answering in a rolling voice that seemed to be lifting the low roof off, +and at the same time flinging money out in handfuls as the horses moved +away. + +They were going slowly down the road. From somewhere in front came +the sound of a clarionet. It was playing “the Black and the Grey.” + Immediately behind there was the tramp of people walking with an even +step, and on either side the rustle of an irregular crowd. The morning +was warm and beautiful. Here and there the last of the golden cushag +glistened on the hedges with the first of the autumn gorse. They passed +two or three houses that had been made roofless by the recent storm, +and once or twice they came on a fallen tree-trunk with its thin leaves +yellowing on the fading grass. + +Kate was floating vaguely through these sights and sounds. It was all +like a dream to her--a waking dream in shadow-land. She knew where she +was and where she was going. Some glimmering of hope was left yet. +She was half expecting a miracle of some sort. Philip would be at the +church. Something supernatural would occur. + +They drew up sharply, the glass of the windows rattled, and the talk +that had been going on in the carriage ceased. “Here we are,” cried +Cæsar; there were voices outside, and then the others inside stepped +down. She saw a hand held out to her and knew whose it was before her +eyes had risen to the face. Philip was there. He was helping her to +alight. + +“Am I to get down too?” she asked in a helpless way. + +Cæsar said something that made the people laugh again, and then she +smiled like faded sunshine and took the hand of Philip. She held it a +moment as if expecting him to say something, but he only raised his hat. +His face was white as marble. He will speak yet, she thought. + +Over the gateway to the churchyard there was an arch of flowers and +evergreens, with an inscription in coloured letters: “God bless the +happy pair.” The sloping path going down as to a dell was strewn with +gilvers and slips of fuchsia. + +At the bottom stood the old church mantled in ivy, like a rock of the +sea covered by green moss. + +Leaning on her father's arm she walked in at the porch. The church was +full of people. As they passed under the gallery there was a twittering +as of birds. The Sunday-school girls were up there, looking down and +talking eagerly. Then the coughing and hemming ceased; there was a sort +of deep inspiration; the church seemed to hold its breath for a moment. +After that there were broken exclamations, and the coughing and hemming +began again. “How pale!”--“Not fit, poor thing.” Everybody was pitying +her starved features. + +“Stand here,” said somebody in a soft voice. + +“Must I?” she said quite loudly. + +All at once she was aware that she was alone before the communion rail, +with the parson--old ruddy-faced Parson Quiggin--in his white surplice +facing her. Some one came and stood beside her. It was Pete. She did not +look at him, but she felt his warm presence again, and was relieved. It +was like shelter from the eyes around. After a moment she turned about +Philip was one step behind Pete. His head was bent. + +Then the service began. The voice of the parson muttered words in a low +voice, but she did not listen. She found herself trying to spell out the +Manx text printed over the chancel arch: “Bannet T'eshyn Ta Cheet ayns +Ennyn y Chearn” (“Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord”). + +Suddenly the words the parson was speaking leapt into meaning and made +her quiver. + +“.... is commended of Saint Paul to be honourable among all men, and +therefore not by any to be enterprised, nor taken in hand unadvisedly, +lightly, or wantonly----” + +She seemed to know that Philip's eyes were on her. They were on the back +of her head, and the veil over her face began to shake. + +The voice of the parson was going on again-- + +“Therefore if any man can show just cause why they may not lawfully be +joined together, let him now speak, or else hereafter for ever hold his +peace.” + +She turned half around. Her eyes fell on Philip. His face was +colourless, almost fierce; his forehead was deathly white. She was sure +that something was about to happen. + +Now was the moment for the miracle. It seemed to her as if the whole +congregation were beginning to divine what tie there was between him and +her. She did not care, for he would soon declare it. He was going to do +so now; he had raised his head, he was about to speak. + +No, there was no miracle. Philip's eyes fell before her eyes, and his +head went down. He was only digging at the red baize with one of his +feet. She felt tired, so very tired, and oh! so cold. The parson had +gone on with his reading. When she caught up with him he was saying-- + +“--as ye shall, answer at the great day of judgment, when the secrets of +all hearts shall be disclosed, that if either of you know any impediment +why ye may not be lawfully joined together in matrimony, ye do now +confess it.” + +The parson paused. He had always paused at that point. The pause had no +meaning for him, but for Kate how much! Impediment! There was indeed an +impediment. Confess? How could she ever confess? The warning terrified +her. It seemed to have been made for her alone. She had heard it before, +and thought nothing of it. Now it seemed to scorch her very soul. She +began to tremble violently. + +There was an indistinct murmur which she did not catch. The parson +seemed to be speaking to Pete-- + +“--love her, comfort her, honour and keep her... so long as ye both +shall live.” + +And then came Pete's voice, full and strong from his great chest, but +far off, and going by her ear like a voice in a shell--“I will.” + +After that the parson's words seemed to be falling on her face. + +“Wilt thou have this man to thy wedded husband, to live together after +God's ordinance in the holy estate of matrimony? Wilt thou obey him and +serve him, love, honour, and keep him in sickness and in health; and +forsaking all other, keep thee unto him, so long as ye both shall live?” + +Kate was far away. She was spelling out the Manx text, “Bannet T'eshyn +Ta Cheet,” but the letters were dancing in and out of each other, and +yellow lights were darting from her eyes. Suddenly she was aware that +the parson's voice had stopped. There was blank silence, then an uneasy +rustle, and then somebody was saying something in a soft tone. + +“Eh?” she said aloud. + +The parson's voice came now in a whisper at her breast--“Say, 'I will.'” + +“Ah I,” she murmured. + +“I-will! That's all, my dear. Say it with me, 'I--will.'” + +She framed her lips to speak, but the words were half uttered by the +parson. The next thing she knew was that a stray hand was holding her +hand. She felt more safe now that her poor cold fingers lay in that big +warm palm. + +It was Pete, and he was speaking again. She did not so much hear him as +feel his voice tingling through her veins. + +“I, Peter Quilliam, take thee, Katherine Cregeen----'” + +But it was all a vague murmur, fraying off into nothing, ending like a +wave with a long upward plash of low sound. + +The parson was speaking to her again, softly, gently, caressingly, +almost as if she were a frightened child. “Don't be afraid, my dear! try +to speak after me. Take your time.” + +Then, aloud, “'I, Katherine Cregeen.'” + +Her throat gurgled; she faltered, but she spoke at length in the +toneless voice of one who speaks in sleep. + +“'I, Katherine Cregeen---'” + +“'Take thee, Peter Quilliam----'” + +The toneless voice broke---- “take thee, Peter Quilliam------'” + +And then all came in a rush, with some of the words distinctly repeated, +and some of them droned and dropped-- + +“--'to my wedded husband, to have and to hold-----'” + +“--'have and to hold-----'” + +“--'from this day forward.... till death do us part-----'” + +“--'death do us part------'” + +“--'therefore I give thee my troth------'” + +“--'troth------'” + +The last word fell like a broken echo, and then there was a rustle in +the church, and much audible breathing. Some of the school-girls in the +gallery were reaching over the pews with parted lips and dancing eyes. + +Pete had taken her left hand, and was putting the ring on her finger. +She was conscious of his warm breath and of the words-- + +“With this ring I thee wed, with my body I thee worship, and with all my +worldly goods I thee endow, Amen.” + +Again she left her cold hand in Pete's warm hand. He was stroking it on +the outside with his other one. + +It was all a dream. She seemed to rally from it as she moved down the +aisle. Ghostly faces were smiling at her out of the air on either side, +and the choir in the gallery behind the school-girls were singing the +psalm, with John the Clerk's husky voice drawling out the first word +of each new verse as his companions were singing the last word of the +preceding one-- + + “Thy wife shall be as the fruitful vine upon the walls of thine house; + Thy children like the olive branches round about thy table. + As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be; + World without end, A--men.” + +They were all in the vestry now, standing together in a group. Her +mother was wiping her eyes, Pete was laughing, and Nancy Joe was +nudging him and saying in an audible whisper, “Kiss her, man--it's only +respectable.” + +The parson was leaning over the table. He spoke to Pete, and then said, +“A substantial mark, too. The lady's turn next.” + +The open book was before her, and the pen was put into her hand. When +she laid it down, the parson returned his spectacles to their sheath, +and a nervous voice, which thrilled and frightened her, said from +behind, “Let me be the first to wish you happiness, Mrs. Quilliam.” + +It was Philip. She turned towards him, and their eyes met for a moment. +But she was only conscious of his prominent nose, his clear-cut chin, +his rapid smile like sunshine, disappearing as before a cloud. He said +something else--something about a new life and a new beginning--but she +could not gather its meaning, her mind would not take it in. At the next +moment they were all in the open air. + + + + +XXII. + +Philip had been in torment--first the torment of an irresistible hatred +of Kate. He knew that this hatred was illogical, that it was monstrous; +but it supported his pride, it held him safe above self-contempt in +being present at the wedding. When the carriage drew up at the church +gate, and he helped Kate to alight, he thought she looked up at him as +one who says, “You see, things are not so bad after all!” And when she +turned her face to him at the beginning of the service, he thought +it wore a look of fierce triumph, of victory, of disdain. But as the +ceremony proceeded and he observed her absent-ness, her vacancy, her +pathetic imbecility, he began to be oppressed by an awful sense of her +consciousness of error. Was she taking this step out of pique? Was she +thinking to punish him, forgetting the price she would have to pay? +Would she awake to-morrow morning with her vexation and vanity gone, +face to face with a hideous future--the worst and most terrible that +is possible to any woman--that of being married to one man and loving +another? + +Faugh! Would his own vanity haunt him even there? Shame, shame! He +forced himself to do the duty of a best man. In the vestry he approached +the bride and muttered the conventional wishes. His heart was devouring +itself like a rapid fire, and it was as much as he could do to look +into her piteous eyes and speak. Struggle as he might at that moment, he +could not put out of his heart a passionate tenderness. This frightened +him, and straightway he resolved to see no more of Kate. He must be fair +to her, he must be true to himself. But walking behind her up the path +strewn with flowers from the church door to the gate, the gnawings of +the worm of buried love came on him again, and he felt like a man who +was being dragged through the dirt. + + + + +XXIII. + +Four saddle-horses, each with its rider seated and ready, had been +waiting at the churchyard gate, pawing up the gravel. The instant the +bride and bridegroom came out of the church the horses set off for +Cæsar's house at a furious gallop. Kate and Pete, Cæsar, Grannie, and +Nancy, with the addition of Philip and Parson Quiggin, returned in the +covered carriage. + +At the turn of the road the way was blocked by a group of stalwart girls +out of the last of the year's cornfields. With the straw rope of the +stackyard stretched across, they demanded toll before the carriage would +be allowed to pass. Pete, who sat by the door, put his head out and +inquired solemnly if the highway women would take their charge in silver +or in kind--half-a-crown apiece or a kiss all round. They laughed, and +answered that they saw no objection to taking both. Whereupon Pete, +whispering behind his hand that the mistress was looking, tossed into +the air a paper bag, which rose like a cannon-ball, broke in the air +like a shell, and fell over their white sun-bonnets like a shower. + +At the door of “The Manx Fairy” the four riders were waiting with +smoking horses. The first to arrive had been rewarded already with a +bottle of rum. He had one other ancient privilege. As the coach drove up +to the door, he stepped up to the bride with the wedding-cake and broke +it over her head. Then there was a scramble for the pieces among the +girls who gathered round her, that they might take them to bed and dream +of a day to come when they should themselves be as proud and happy. + +The wedding-breakfast (a wedding-dinner) was laid in the loft of the +mill, the chapel of The Christians. Cæsar sat at the head of the table, +with Grannie on one side and Kate on the other. Pete sat next to Kate, +and Philip next to Grannie. The parson sat at the foot with Nancy Joe, a +lady of consequence, receiving much consideration, at his reverent right +hand. Jonaique Jelly sat midway down the table, with a fine scorn on +his features, for John the Clerk sat opposite with a fiddle gripped +between his knees. + +The neighbours brought in the joints of beef and mutton, the chickens +and the ducks. Cæsar and the parson carved. Black Tom, who had been +invited by way of truce, served out the liquor from an eighteen-gallon +cask, and sucked it up himself like the sole of an old shoe. Then Cæsar +said grace, and the company fell to. Such noise, such sport, such chaff, +such laughter! Everything was a jest--every word had wit in it. “How are +you doing, John?”--“Haven't done as well for a month, sir; but what's +it saying, two hungry meals make the third a glutton.”--“How are _you_ +doing, Tom?”--“No time to get a right mouthful for myself Cæsar; kept +so busy with the drink.”--“Aw, there'll be some with their top works +hampered soon.”--“Got plenty, Jonaique?”--“Plenty, sir, plenty. Enough +down here to victual a menagerie. It'll be Sunday every day of the week +with the man that's getting the lavings.”--“Take a taste of this +beef before it goes, Mr. Thomas Quilliam, or do you prefer the +mutton?”--“I'm not partic'lar, Mr. Cregeen. Ateing's nothing to me +but filling a sack that's empty.” + +Grannie praised the wedding service--it was lovely--it was +beautiful--she didn't think the ould parzon could have made the like; +but Cæsar criticised both church and clergy--couldn't see what for the +cross on the pulpit and the petticoat on the parson. “Popery, sir, clane +Popery,” he whispered across Grannie to Philip. + +Away went the shanks of mutton, the breasts of birds, and the slabs of +beef, and up came an apple-pudding as round as a well-fed salmon, and as +long as a twenty-pound cod. There was a shout of welcome. “None of your +dynamite pudding that,--as green as grass and as sour as vinegar.” + +Kate was called on to make the first cut of the monster. A faint colour +had returned to her cheeks since she had come home. She was talking a +little, and even laughing sometimes, as if the weight on her heart +was lightening every moment. She rose at the call, took, with the hand +nearest to the dish, the knife that her father held out, and plunged +it into the pudding. As she did so, with all eyes upon her, the +wedding-ring on her finger flashed in the light and was seen by +everybody. + +“Look at that, though,” cried Black Tom. “There's the wife for a +husband, if you plaze. Ashamed of showing it, is she? Not she, the +bogh.” + +Then there was much giggling among the younger women, and cries of “Aw, +the poor girl! Going to church has been making her left-handed!” + +“Time enough, my beauties,” cried Pete; “and mind you're not struck that +way yourselves one of these days.” + +Away went the dishes, and the parson rose to return thanks. + +“Never heard that grace but once before, Parson Quiggin,” said Pete, +“and then”--lighting his pipe--“then it was a burial sarvice.” + +“A _burial_ sarvice!” + +A dozen voices echoed the words together, and in a moment the table was +quiet. + +“Yes, though,” said Pete. “It was up at Johannesburg. Two chums settled +there, and one married a girl. Nice lil thing, too; some of the Boer +girls, you know; but not much ballast at her at all. The husband went +up country for the Consolidated Co., and when he came back there was +trouble. Chum had been sweethearting the wife a bit!” + +“Aw, dear!”--“Aw, well, well!” + +“Do? The husband? He went after the chum with a repeater, and took him. +Bath-chair sort of a chap--no fight in him at all. 'Mercy!' he cries. 'I +can't,' says the husband. 'Forgive him this once,' says the wife. 'It's +only once a woman loses herself,' says the man. 'Mercy, mercy!' 'Say +your prayers.' 'Mercy, mercy, mercy!' 'Too late!' and the husband shot +him dead. The woman dropped in a faint, but the man said, 'He didn't say +his prayers, though--I must be doing it for him.' Then down he went on +his knees by the body, but the prayers were all forgot at him--all but +the bit of a grace, so he said that instead.” + +Loud breathings on every side followed Pete's story, and Cæsar, leaning +over towards Philip, whose face had grown ashy, said, “Terrible, sir, +terrible! But still and for all, right enough, though, eh! What's it +saying, Better an enemy than a bad friend.” + +Philip answered absently; his eyes were on the opposite side of the +table. There was a sudden rising of the people about Kate. + +“Water, there,” shouted Pete. “It's a thundering blockhead I am for +sure--frightning the life out of people with stories fit for a funeral.” + +“No, no,” said Kate; “I'm not faint Why should you think so?” + +“Of coorse, not, bogh,” said Nancy, who was behind her in a twinkling. +“White is she? Well, what of it, man? It's only becoming on a girl's +wedding-day. Take a lil sup, though, woman--there, there!” + +Kate drank the water, with the glass jingling against her teeth, and +then began to laugh. The parson's ruddy face rose at the end of the +table. “Friends,” he said, “after that tragic story, let us indulge in +a little vanity. Fill up your glasses to the brim, and drink with me to +the health of the happy couple. We all know both of them. We know the +bride for a good daughter and a sweet girl--one so naturally pure that +nobody can ever say an evil word or think an evil thought when she is +near. We know the bridegroom for a real Manxman, simple and rugged and +true, who says all he thinks and thinks all he says. God has been +very good to them. Such virginal and transparent souls have much to be +thankful for. It is not for them to struggle with that worst enemy of +man, the enemy that is within, the enemy of bad passions. So we can wish +them joy on their union with a full heart and a sure hope that, whatever +chance befall them on the ways of this world, they will be happy and +content.” + +“Aw, the beautiful advice,” said Grannie, wiping her eyes. + +“Popery, just Popery,” muttered Cæsar. “What about original sin?” + +There was a chorus of applause. Kate was still laughing. Philip's head +was down. + +“And now, friends,” continued the parson, “Captain Quilliam has been a +successful man abroad, but he has had to come home to do the best piece +of work he ever did.” (A voice--“Do it yourself, parzon.”) “It is true +I've never done it myself. Vanity of vanities, love is not for me. It's +been the Lord's will to put me here to do the marrying and leave my +people to do the loving. But there is a young man present who has all +the world before him and everything this life can promise except one +thing, and that's the best thing of all--a wife.” (Kate's laughter grew +boisterous.) “This morning he helped his friend to marry a pure and +beautiful maiden. Now let me remind him of the text which says, 'Go thou +and do likewise.'” + +The toast was drunk standing, with shouts of “Cap'n Pete,” and, +amid much hammering on the table, stamping on the floor, and other +thunderings of applause, Cap'n Pete rolled up to reply. After a moment's +pause, in which he distributed sage winks and nods on every side, he +said: “I'm not much for public spaking myself. I made my best speech and +my shortest in church this morning--_I will_. The parzon has has been +telling my _dooiney molla_ to do as I have done today. He can't. Begging +pardon of the ladies, there's only one woman on the island fit for him, +and I've got her.” (Kate's laughter grew shrill.) “My wife----” + +At this word, uttered with an air of life-long familiarity, twenty +clay pipes lost their heads by collision with the table, and Pete was +interrupted by roars of laughter. + +“Gough bless me, can't a married man mention his wife in company? Well +then. Mistress Cap'n Peter Quilliam----” + +This mouthful was the signal for another riotous interruption, and a +general call for more to drink. + +“Won't that do for you neither? I'm not going back on it, though. 'Whom +God hath joined together let no man put asunder'--isn't that it, Parzon +Quiggin? What's it you're saying--no man but the Dempster? Well, the +Dempster's here that is to be--I'll clear him of _that_, anyway.” + +Kate's laughter became explosive and uncontrollable. Pete nodded +sideways to fill up the gap in his eloquence, and then went on. “But if +my _dooiney molla_ can't marry my wife, there's one thing he can do for +her--he can make her house his home in Ramsey when he goes to Douglas +for good and comes down here to the coorts once a fortnight.” + +Kate laughed more immoderately than ever; but Philip, with a look of +alarm, half rose from his seat, and said across the table, “There's my +aunt at Ballure, Pete.” + +“She'll be following after you,” said Pete. + +“There are hotels enough for travellers,” said Philip. + +“Too many by half, and that's why I asked in public,” said Pete. + +“I know the brotherly feeling----” began Philip. + +“Is it a promise?” demanded Pete. + +“If I can't escape your kindness----” + +“No, you can't; so there's an end of it.” + +“It will kill me yet----” + +“May you never die till it polishes you off.”. + +At Philip's submission to Pete's will, there was a general chorus of +cheers, through which Kate's shrill laughter rang like a scream. Pete +patted the back of her hand, and continued, “And now, young fellows +there, let an ould experienced married man give you a bit of advice--he +swore away all his worldly goods this morning, so he hasn't much else to +give. I've no belief in bachelors myself. They're like a tub without a +handle--nothing to lay hould of them by.” (Much nudging and whispering +about the bottom of the table.) “What's that down yonder? 'The vicar,' +you say? Aw, the vicar's a grand man, but he's only a parzon, you see. +Mr. Christian, is it? He's got too much work to do to be thinking about +women. We're living on the nineteenth century, boys, and it's middling +hard feeding for some of us. If the fishing's going to the dogs and the +farming going to the deuce, don't be tossing head over tip at the tail +of the tourist. If you've got the pumping engine inside of you, in plain +English, if you've got the indomable character of the rael Manxman, do +as I done--go foreign. Then watch your opportunity. What's Shake-spar +saying?” Pete paused. “What's that he's saying, now?” Pete scratched his +forehead. “Something about a flood, anyway.” Pete stretched his hand out +vigorously. “'Lay hould of it at the flood,' says he, 'that's the way to +make your fortune.'” + +Then Pete melted to sentiment, glanced down at Kate's head, and +continued, “And when you come back to the ould island--and there isn't +no place like it--you can marry the girl of your heart, God bless her. +Work's black, but money's white, and love is as sweet on potatoes and +herrings three times a day, as on nothing for dinner, and the same every +night of the week for supper. While you're away, you'll be draming of +her. 'Is she faithful?' 'Is she thrue?' Coorse she is, and waiting to +take you the very minute you come home.” Kate was still laughing as if +she could not stop. “Look out for the right sort, boys. Plenty of the +like in yet. If the young men of these days are more smart and more +educated than their fathers, the young women are more handsome and more +virtuous than their mothers. So _ben-my-chree_, my hearties, and enough +in the locker to drive away the divil and the coroner.” + +Through the volley of cheers which followed Pete's speech came the +voice of Black Tom, thick with drink, “Drive off the crow at the +wedding-breakfast.” + +Everybody rose and looked. A great crow, black as night, had come in +at the open door of the mill, calmly, sedately, as if by habit, for the +corn that usually lay there. + +“It manes divorce,” said Black Tom. + +“Scare it away,” cried some one. + +“It's the new wife must do it,” said another. + +“Where's Kate?” cried Nancy. + +But Kate only looked and went on laughing as before. + +The crow turned tail and took flight of itself at finding so eager +an audience. Then Pete said, “Whose houlding with such ould wife's +wonders?” + +And Cæsar answered, “Coorse not, or fairies either. I've slept out all +night on Cronk-ny-airy-Lhaa--before my days of grace, I mane--and I +never seen no fairies.” + +“It would be a fool of a fairy, though, that would let _you_ see him, +Cæsar,” said Black Tom. + +At nine o'clock Cæsar's gig was at the door of “The Manx Fairy” to take +the bride and bridegroom home. They had sung “Mylecharane,” and “Keerie +fu Snaighty,” and “Hunting the Wren,” and “The Win' that Shook the +Barley,” and then they had cleared away the tables and danced to the +fiddle of John the Clerk and the clarionet of Jonaique Jelly. Kate, with +wild eyes and flushed cheeks, had taken part in everything, but always +fiercely, violently, almost tempestuously, until people lost enjoyment +of her heartiness in fear of her hysteria, and Cæsar whispered Pete to +take her away, and brought round the gig to hasten them. + +Kate went up for her cloak and hat, and in the interval between her +departure and reappearance, Grannie and Nancy Joe, both glorified +beings, Nancy with her unaccustomed cap askew, stood in the middle of a +group of women, who were deferring, and inquiring, and sympathising. + +“I don't know in the world how she has kept up so long,” said Grannie. + +“And dear heart knows how _I'm_ to keep up when she's gone,” said Nancy, +with her apron to her eyes. + +Kate came down ready. Everybody followed her into the road, and all +stood round the gig with flashes from the gig-lamps on their faces, +while Pete swung her up into the seat, lifting her bodily in his great +arms. + +“You wouldn't drown yourself to-night for an ould rusty nail, eh, +Capt'n?” cried somebody with a laugh. + +“You go bail,” said Pete, and he leapt up to Kate's side, twiddled the +reins, cracked the whip, and they drove away. + + + + +XXIV. + +Philip had stood at the door of the porch, struggling to command his +soul, and employing all his powers to look cheerful and even gay. But as +Kate had passed she had looked at him with an imploring look, and then +he had seemed to understand everything--that she had made a mistake and +that she knew it, that her laughter had been bitterer than tears, that +some compulsion had been put upon her, and that she was a wretched and +miserable woman. At the next moment she had gone by with an odour +of lace and perfume; and then a flood of tenderness, of pity, of mad +jealousy had come upon him, and it had been as much as he could do to +restrain himself. One instant he held himself in hand, and at the next +the wheels of the gig had begun to move, the horse had started, the +women had trooped into the house again, and there was nothing before him +but the broad back of Cæsar, who was looking into the darkness after the +vanishing gig-lamps, and breathing asthmatical breath. + +“Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother and shall cleave +unto his wife,” said Cæsar. “You're time enough yet, sir; come in, come +in.” + +But the man was odious to Philip at that moment, the house was odious, +the people and the talk inside were odious, and he slipped away +unobserved. + +Too late! From the torment of his own thoughts he could not escape--his +lost love, his lost happiness, his memories of the past, his dreams of +the future. A voice--it was his own voice--seemed to be taunting him +constantly: “You were not worthy of her. You did not know her value. She +is gone; and what have you got instead!” + +The Deemstership! That was of no consequence now. A name, an idle name! +Love was the only thing worth having, and it was lost. Without it all +the rest was nothing, and he had flung it away. He had been a monster, +he had been a fool. The thought of his folly was insupportable; +the recollection of his selfishness was stifling; the memory of his +calculating deliberations was dragging him again in the dust. Thus, with +a sense of crushing shame, he plunged down the dark road, trying not to +think of the gig that had gone swinging along in front of him. + +He would leave the island. To-morrow he would sail for England. No +matter if he lost the chance of promotion. To-morrow, to-morrow! But +to-night? How could he live through the hours until morning, with the +black thoughts which the darkness generated? How could he sleep? How lie +awake? What drug would bring forgetfulness? Kate! Pete! To-night! Oh, +God! oh, God! + + + + +XXV. + +Six strides of the horse into the darkness and Kate's hysteria was +gone. She had been lost to herself the whole day-through, and now she +possessed herself again. She grew quiet and silent, and even solemn. But +Pete rattled on with cheerful talk about the day's doings. At the doors +of the houses on the road as they passed, people were standing in the +half-light to wave them salutations, and Pete sent back his answers in +shouts and laughter. Turning the bridge they saw a little group at the +porch of the “Ginger.” + +“There's company waiting for us yonder,” said Pete, giving the mare a +touch of the whip. + +“Let us get on,” said Kate in a nervous whisper. + +“Aw, let's be neighbourly, you know,” said Pete. “It wouldn't be dacent +to disappoint people at all. We'll hawl up for a minute just, and hoof +up the time at a gallop. Woa, lass, woa, mare, woa, bogh!” + +As the gig drew up at the inn door, a voice out of the porch cried, “Joy +to you, Capt'n, and joy to your lady, and long life and prosperity to +you both, and may the Lord give you children and health and happiness to +rear them, and may you see your children's children, and may they call +you blessed.” + +“Glasses round. Mrs. Kelly,” shouted Pete. + +“Go on, please,” said Kate in a fretful whisper, and she tugged at +Pete's sleeve. + +The stars came out; the moon gave a peep; the late hay of the Curragh +sent a sweet odour through the night. Kate shuddered and Pete covered +her shoulders with a rug. Then he began to sing snatches. He sang bits +of all the songs that had been sung that night, but kept coming back at +intervals to an old Manx ditty which begins-- + + “Little red bird of the black turf ground, + Where did you sleep last night?” + +Thus he sang like a great boy as he went rolling down the dark road, and +Kate sat by his side and trembled. + +They came to the town, rattled down the Parliament Street, passed the +Court-house under the trees, turned the sharp angle by the market-place, +and drew up at Elm Cottage in the corner. + +“Home at last,” cried Pete, and he leapt to the ground. + +A dog began to bark inside the house. “D'ye hear him?” said Pete. +“That's the master in charge.” + +The porch door was opened, and a comfortable-looking woman in a widow's +cap came out with a lighted candle shaded by her hand. + +“And this is your housekeeper, Mrs. Gorry,” said Pete. + +Kate did not answer. Her eyes had been fixed in a rigid stare on the +hind-quarters of the horse, which were steaming in the light of the +lamps. Pete lifted her down as he had lifted her up. Then Mrs. Gorry +took her by the hand, and saying, “Mind the step, ma'am--this way, +ma'am,” led her through the gate and along the garden path, and up +to the porch. The porch opened on a square hall, furnished as a +sitting-room. A fire was burning, a lamp was lit, the table was laid for +supper, and the place was warm and cosy. + +“_There!_ What d'ye say to _that_?” cried Pete, coming behind with the +whip in his hand. + +Kate looked around; she did not speak; her eyes began to fill. + +“Isn't it fit for a Dempster's lady?” said Pete, sweeping the +whip-handle round the room like a showman. + +Kate could bear no more. She sank into a chair and burst into a fit of +tears. Pete's glowing face dropped in an instant. + +“Dear heart alive, darling, what is it?” he said. “My poor girl, what's +troubling you at all? Tell me, now--tell me, bogh, tell me.” + +“It's nothing, Pete, nothing. Don't ask me,” said Kate. But still she +sobbed as if her heart would break. + +Pete stood a moment by her side, smoothing her arm with his hand. Then +he said, with a crack and a quaver in his great voice, “It _is_ hard +for a girl, I know that, to lave father and mother and every one and +everything that's been sweet and dear to her since she was a child, and +to come to the house of her husband and say, 'The past has been very +good to me; but still and for all, I'm for trusting the future to you.' +It's hard, darling; I know it's hard.” + +“Oh, leave me! leave me!” cried Kate, still weeping. + +Pete brushed his sleeve across his eyes, and said, “Take her upstairs, +Mrs. Gorry, while I'm putting up the mare at the 'Saddle.'” + +Then he whistled to the dog, which had been watching him from the +hearthrug, and went out of the house. The handle of the whip dragged +after him along the floor. + +Mrs. Gorry, full of trouble, took Kate to her room. Would she not eat +her supper? Then salts were good for headache-should she bring a bottle +from her box? After many fruitless inquiries and nervous protestations, +the good soul bade Kate good-night and left her. + +Being alone, Kate broke into yet wilder paroxysms of weeping. The +storm-cloud which had been gathering had burst at last. It seemed as if +the whole weight of the day had been deferred until then. The piled-up +hopes of weeks had waited for that hour, to be cast down in the sight +of her own eyes. It was all over. The fight with Fate was done, and the +frantic merriment with which she had kept down her sense of the place +where the blind struggle had left her made the sick recoil more bitter. + +She thought of Philip, and her trouble began to moderate. Somewhere out +of the uncrushed part of her womanhood there came one flicker of womanly +pride to comfort her. She saw Philip at last from the point of revenge. +He loved her; he would never cease to love her. Do what he might to +banish the thought of her, she would be with him always; the more surely +with him, the more reproachfully and unattainably, because she would +be the wife of another man. If he could put her away from him in the +daytime, and in the presence of those worldly aims for which he had +sacrificed her, when night came he would be able to put her away no +more. He would never sleep but he would see her. In every dream he would +stretch out his arms to her, but she would not be there, and he would +awake with sobs and in torment. There was a real joy in this thought, +although it tore her heart so terribly. + +She got strength from the cruel comforting, and Mrs. Gorry in the room +below, listening intently, heard her crying cease. With her face still +shut in both her hands, she was telling herself that she had nothing to +reproach herself with; that she could not have acted differently; that +she had not really made this marriage; that she had only submitted to +it, being swept along by the pitiless tide, which was her father, and +Pete, and everybody. She was telling herself, too, that, after all, she +had done well. Here she lay in close harbour from the fierce storm which +had threatened her. She was safe, she was at peace. + +The room lay still. The night was very quiet within those walls. Kate +drew down her hands and looked about her. The fire was burning gently, +and warming her foot on the sheepskin rug that lay in front of it. A +lamp burned low on a table behind her chair. At one side there was a +wardrobe of the shape of an old press, but with a tall mirror in the +door; on the other side there was the bed, with the pink curtains +hanging like a tent. The place had a strange look of familiarity. It +seemed as if she had known it all her life. She rose to look around, and +then the inner sense leapt to the outer vision, and she saw how it was. +The room was a reproduction of her own bedroom at home, only newer and +more luxurious. It was almost as if some ghost of herself had been there +while she slept--as if her own hand had done everything in a dream of +her girlhood wherein common things had become grand. + +Kate's eyes began to fill afresh, and she turned to take off her cloak. +As she did so, she saw something on the dressing-table with a label +attached to it. She took it up. It was a little mirror, a handglass +like her own old one, only framed in ivory, and the writing on the label +ran-- + + Insted of The one that is bruk with fond Luv to Kirry. + + peat. + +Her heart was now beating furiously. A flood of feeling had rushed over +her. She dropped the glass as if it stung her fingers. With both hands +she covered her face. Everything in the room seemed to be accusing her. +Hitherto she had thought only of Philip. Now for the first time she +thought of Pete. + +She had wronged him--deeply, awfully, beyond atonement or hope of +forgiveness. He loved her; he had married her; he had brought her to +his home, to this harbour of safety, and she had deceived and betrayed +him--she had suffered herself to be married to him while still loving +another man. + +A sudden faintness seized her. She grew dizzy and almost fell. A more +terrible memory had come behind. The thought was like ravens flapping +their black wings on her brain. She felt her temples beating against her +hands. They seemed to be sucking the life out of her heart. + +Just then the voice of Pete came beating up the echoes between the house +and the chapel beyond the garden-- + + “Little red bird of the black turf ground, + Where did you sleep last night?” + +She heard him open the garden gate, clash it back, come up the path with +an eager step, shut the door of the house and chain it on the inside. +Then she heard his deep voice speaking below. + +“Better now, Mrs. Gorry?” + +“Aw, better, sir, yes, and quiet enough this ten minutes.” + +“Give her time, the bogh! Be aisy with the like, be aisy.” + +Presently she heard him send off Mrs. Gorry for the night, saying he +should want no supper, and should be going to bed soon. Then the house +became quiet, and the smell of tobacco smoke came floating up the +stairs. + +Kate's hot breath on her hands grew damp against her face. She felt +herself swooning, and she caught hold of the mantelpiece. + +“It cannot be,” she thought. “He must not come. I will go down to him +and say, 'Pete, forgive me, I am really the wife of another.'” + +Then she would tell him everything. Yes, she would confess all now. +Oh, she would not be afraid. His love was great. He would do what she +wished. + +She made one step towards the door, and was pulled up as by a curb. Pete +would say, “Do you mean that you have been using me as a cloak? Do you +ask me to live in this house, side by side with you, and let no one +suspect that we are apart? Then why did you not ask me yesterday? Why do +you ask me to-day, when it is too late to choose?” + +No, she could not confess. If confession had been difficult yesterday, +it was a thousand times more difficult to-day, and it would be a +thousand thousand times more difficult tomorrow. + +Kate caught up the cloak she had thrown aside. She must go away. +Anywhere, anywhere, no matter where. That was the one thing left to +her--the only escape from the wild tangle of dread and pain. Pete was in +the hall; there must be a way out at the back; she would find it. + +She lowered the lamp, and turned the handle of the door. Then she saw a +light moving on the landing, and heard a soft step on the stairs. It +was Pete, with a candle, coming up in his stockinged feet. He stopped +midway, as if he heard the click of the latch, and then went noiselessly +down again. + +Kate closed the door. She would not go. If she left the house that night +she would cover Pete with suspicion and disgrace. The true secret would +never be known; the real offender would never suffer; but the finger of +scorn would be raised at the one man who had sheltered and shielded her, +and he would die of humiliation and blind self-reproach. + +This reflection restrained her for the moment, and when the stress of +it was spent she was mastered by a fear that was far more terrible. For +good or for all she was now married to Pete, and he had the rights of +a husband. He had a right to come to her, and he _would_ come. It +was inevitable; it had to be. No boy or girl love now, no wooing, no +dallying, no denying, but a grim reality of life--a reality that comes +to every woman who is married to a man. She was married to Pete. In the +eye of the world, in the eye of the law, she was his, and to fly from +him was impossible. + +She must remain. God himself had willed it As for the shame of her +former relation to Philip, it was her own secret. God alone knew of it, +and He would keep it safe. It was the dark chamber of her heart which +God only could unlock. He would never unlock it until the Day of +Judgment, and then Philip would be standing by her side, and she would +cast it back upon him, and say, “His, not mine, O God,” and the Great +Judge of all would judge between them. + +But she began to cry again, like a child in the dark. As she threw off +her cloak a second time, her dress crinkled, and she looked down at it +and remembered that it was her wedding-dress. Then she looked around at +the room, and remembered that it was her wedding chamber. She remembered +how she had dreamt of coming in her bridal dress to her bridal +room--proud, afraid, tingling with love, blushing with joy, whispering +to herself, “This is for me--and this--and this. _He_ has given it, for +he loves me and I love him, and he is mine and I am his, and he is my +love and my lord, and he is coming to--” + +There was a gentle knocking at the door. It made her flesh creep. The +knock came again. It went shrieking through and through her. + +“Kirry,” whispered a voice from without. + +She did not stir. + +“It's only Pete.” + +She neither spoke nor moved. + +There was silence for a moment, and then, half nervously, half jovially, +half in laughter, half with emotion as if the heart outside was +palpitating, the voice came again, “I'm coming in, darling!” + + + + +PART IV. MAN AND WIFE. + + + + +I. + +Next morning Kate said to herself, “My life must begin again from +to-day.” She had a secret that Pete did not share, but she was not the +first woman who had kept something from her husband. When people had +secrets which it would hurt others to reveal, they ought to keep them +close. Honour demanded that she should be as firm as a rock in blotting +Philip from her soul. Remembering the promise which Pete had demanded of +Philip at the wedding to make their house his home in Ramsey, and seeing +that Philip must come, if only to save appearances, she asked herself +if she ought to prevent him. But no! She resolved to conquer the passion +that made his presence a danger. There was no safety in separation. In +her relation to Philip she was like the convict who is beginning his +life again--the only place where he can build up a sure career is +precisely there where his crime is known. “Let Philip come,” she +thought. She made his room ready. + +She was married. It was her duty to be a good wife. Pete loved +her--his love would make it easy. They were sitting at breakfast in the +hall-parlour, and she said, “I should like to be my own housekeeper, +Pete.” + +“And right, too,” said Pete. “Be your own woman, darling--not your +woman's woman--and have Mrs. Gorry for your housemaid.” + +To turn her mind from evil thoughts, she set to work immediately, and +busied herself with little duties, little economies, little cares, +little troubles. But the virtues of housekeeping were just those for +which she had not prepared herself. Her first leg of mutton was roasted +down to the proportions of a frizzled shank, and her first pudding was +baked to the colour and consistency of a badly burnt brick. She did not +mend rapidly as a cook, but Pete ate of all that his faultless teeth +could grind through, and laid the blame on his appetite when his +digestion failed. + +She strove by other industries to keep alive a sense of her duty as a +wife. Buying rolls of paper at the paperhanger's, she set about papering +every closet in the house. The patterns did not join and the paste did +not adhere. She initialled in worsted the new blankets sent by Grannie, +with a P and a Q and a K intertwined. Than she overhauled the linen; +turned out every room twice a week; painted every available wooden +fixture with paint which would not dry because she had mixed it herself +to save a sixpence a stone and forgotten the turpentine. Pete held up +his hands in admiration at all her failures. She had thought it would be +easy to be a good wife to a good husband. It was hard--hard for any +one, hardest of all for her. There are the ruins of a happy woman in the +bosom of every over-indulged wife. + +She could not keep to anything long, but every night for a week she +gave Pete lessons in reading, writing, and arithmetic. His reading was +laborious, his spelling was eccentric, his figuring he did on the tips +of his heavy fingers, and his writing he executed with his tongue in his +cheek and his ponderous thumb down on the pen nib. + +“What letter is that, Pete?” she said, pointing with her knitting needle +to the page of a book of poems before them. + +Pete looked up in astonishment. “Is it _me_ you're asking, Kitty? If +_you_ don't know, _I_ don't know.” + +“That's a capital M, Pete.” + +“Is it, now?” said Pete, looking at the letter with a searching eye. +“Goodness me, the straight it's like the gate of the long meadow.” + +“And that's a capital A.” + +“Sakes alive, the straight it's like the coupling of the cart-house.” + +“And that's a B.” + +“Gough bless me, d'ye say so? But the straight it's like the hoof of a +bull, though.” + +“And M A B spells Mab--Queen Mab,” said Kate, going on with her +knitting. + +Pete looked up at her with eyes wide open. “I suppose, now,” he said, in +a voice of pride, “I suppose you're knowing all the big spells yourself, +Kitty?” + +“Not all. Sometimes I have to look in the dictionary,” said Kate. + +She showed him the book and explained its uses. + +“And is it taiching you to spell every word, Kitty?” he asked. + +“Every ordinary word,” said Kate. + +“My gough!” said Pete, touching the book with awe. + +Next day he pored over the dictionary for an hour, but when he raised +his face it wore a look of scepticism and scorn. “This spelling-book +isn't taiching you nothing, darling,” he said. + +“Isn't it. Pete?” + +“No, nothing,” said Pete. “Here I've been looking for an ordinary +word--a _very_ ordinary word--and it isn't in.” + +“What word is it?” said Elate, leaning over his shoulder. + +“_Love_,” said Pete. “See,” pointing his big forefinger, “that's where +it ought to be, and where is it?” + +“But _love_ begins _lo_,” said Kate, “and you're looking at _lu_. Here +it is--love.” + +Pete gave a prolonged whistle, then fell back in his chair, looked +slowly up and said, “So you must first know how the word begins; is that +it, Kitty?” + +“Why, yes,” said Kate. + +“Then it's you that's taiching the spelling-book, darling; so we'll put +it back on the shelf.” + +For a fortnight Kate read and replied to Pete's correspondence. It was +plentiful and various. Letters from heirs to lost fortunes offering +shares in return for money to buy them out of Chancery; from promoters +of companies proposing dancing palaces to meet the needs of English +visitors; from parsons begging subscriptions to new organs; from +fashionable ladies asking Pete to open bazaars; from preachers inviting +him to anniversary tea-meetings, and saying Methodism was proud of him. +If anybody wanted money, he kissed the Blarney Stone and applied to +Pete. Kate stood between him and the worst of the leeches. The best of +them he contrived to deal with himself, secretly and surreptitiously. +Sometimes there came acknowledgments of charities of which Kate knew +nothing. Then he would shuffle them away and she would try not to see +them. “If I stop him altogether, I will spoil him,” she thought. + +One day the post brought a large envelope with a great seal at the +back of it, and Kate drew out a parchment deed and began to read the +indorsement--“'Memorandum of loan to Cæsar Cre-----'” + +“That's nothing,” said Pete, snatching the document and stuffing it into +his jacket-pocket. + +Kate lifted her eyes with a look of pain and shame and humiliation, and +that was the end of her secretaryship. + + + + +II. + +A month after their marriage a man came through the gate with the air of +one who was doing a degrading thing. The dog, which had been spread out +lazily in the sun before the porch, leapt up and barked furiously. + +“Who's this coming up the path with his eyes all round him like a +scallop?” said Pete. + +Kate looked. “It's Ross Christian,” she said, with a catch in her +breathing. + +Ross came up, and Pete met him at the door. His face was puffy and pale, +his speech was soft and lisping, yet there lurked about the man an air +of levity and irony. + +“Your dog doesn't easily make friends, Peter,” he said. + +“He's like his master, sir; it's against the principles of his life,” + said Pete. + +Ross laughed a little. “Wants to be approached with consideration, does +he, Capt'n?” + +“You see, he's lived such a long time in the world and seen such a +dale,” said Pete. + +Ross looked up sharply and said in another tone, “I've just dropped +in to congratulate you on your return home in safety and health and +prosperity, Mr. Quilliam.” + +“You're welcome, sir,” said Pete. + +Pete led the way indoors. Ross followed, bowed distantly to Kate, who +was unpicking a dress, and took a chair. + +“I must not conceal from you, however, that I have another object--in +fact, a private matter,” said Ross, glancing at Kate. + +The dress rustled in Kate's fingers, her scissors dropped on to the +table, and she rose to go. + +Pete raised his hand. “My wife knows all my business,” he said. + +Ross gave out another little chirp of laughter. “You'll remember what +they say of a secret, Captain--too big for one, right for two, tight for +three.” + +“A man and his wife are one, sir--so that's two altogether,” said Pete. + +Kate took up the scissors and went on with her work uneasily. Ross +twisted on his seat and said, “Well, I feel I _must_ tell you, Peter.” + +“Quilliam, sir,” said Pete, charging a pipe; but Ross pretended not to +hear. + +“Only natural, perhaps, for it--in fact, it's about our father.” + +“Tongue with me, tongue with thee,” thought Pete, lighting up. + +“Five years ago he made me an allowance, and sent me up to London to +study law. He believes I've been called to the English bar, and, in view +of this vacant Deemstership, he wants me admitted to the Manx one.” + +Pete's pipe stopped in its puffing. “Well?” + +“That's impossible,” said Ross. + +“Things haven't come with you, eh?” + +“To tell you the truth, Captain, on first going up I fell into +extravagant company. I thought my friends were rich men, and I was never +a niggard. There was Monty, the patron of the Fancy”--the scissors in +Kate's hand clicked and stopped--and Ross blurted out, “In fact, I've +_not_ been called, and I've never studied at all.” + +Ross squirmed in his chair, glancing under his brows at Kate. Pete +leaned forward and puffed up the chimney without speaking. + +“You see I speak freely, Peter--something compels me. Well, if a man +can't reveal his little failings to his own brother, Peter----” + +“Don't let's talk about brothers,” said Pete. “What am I to do for you?” + +“Lend me enough to help me to do what our father thinks I've done +already,” said Ross, and then he added, hastily, “Oh, I'll give you my +note of hand for it.” + +“They're telling me, sir,” said Pete, “your notes of hand are as cheap +as cowries.” + +“Some one has belied me to you, Captain. But for our father's sake--he +has set his heart on this Deemstership--there may still be time for it.” + +“Yes,” said Pete, striking his open hand on the table, “and better men +to fill it.” + +Ross glanced at Kate, and a smile that was half a sneer crossed his evil +face. “How nice,” he said, “when the great friends of the wife are also +the great friends of the husband.” + +“Just so,” said Pete, and then Ross laughed a little, and the clicking +of Kate's scissors stopped again. “As to you, sir,” said Pete, rising, +“if it's no disrespect, you're like the cormorant that chokes itself +swallowing its fish head-ways up. The gills are sticking in your +gizzard, sir, only,” touching Ross's shoulder with something between a +pat and push, “you shouldn't be coming to your father's son to help you +to ram it down.” + +As Ross went out Cæsar came in. “That wastrel's been wanting something,” + said Cæsar. + +“The tide's down on him,” said Pete. + +“Always was, and always will be. He was born at low water, and he'll die +on the rocks. Borrowing money, eh?” said Cæsar, with a searching glance. + +“Trying to,” said Pete indifferently. + +“Then lend it, sir,” said Cæsar promptly. “He's not to trust, but lend +it on his heirship. Or lend it the ould man at mortgage on Ballawhaine. +He's the besom of fire--it'll come to you, sir, at the father's death, +and who has more right?” + +The shank of Pete's pipe came down from his mouth as he sat for some +moments beating out the ash on the jockey bar. “Something in that, +though,” he said mechanically. “But there's another has first claim for +all. He'd be having the place now if every one had his own. I must be +thinking of it--I must be thinking of it.” + + + + +III. + +Philip had left the island on the morning after the marriage. He had +gone abroad, and when they heard from him first he was at Cairo. The +voyage out had done him good--the long, steady nights going down +the Mediterranean--walking the deck alone--the soft air--the far-off +lights--thought he was feeling better--calmer anyway. He hoped they were +settled in their new home, and well--and happy. Kate had to read the +letter aloud. It was like a throb of Philip's heart made faint, feeble, +and hardly to be felt by the great distance. Then she had to reply to it +on behalf of Pete. + +“Tell him to be quick and come out of the land of Egypt and the house of +bondage,” said Pete. “Say there's no manner of sense of a handsome young +man living in a country where there isn't a pretty face to be seen on +the sunny side of a blanket. Write that Kirry joins with her love and +best respects and she's busy whitewashing, and he'd better have no truck +with Pharaoh's daughters.” + +The next time they heard from Philip he was at Rome. He had suffered +from sleeplessness, but was not otherwise unwell. Living in that city +was like an existence after death--all the real life was behind you. But +it was not unpleasant to walk under the big moon amid the wrecks of the +past. He congratulated Mrs. Quilliam on her active occupation--work was +the same as suffering--it was strength and power. Kate had to read this +letter also. It was like a sob coming over the sea. + +“Give him a merry touch to keep up his pecker,” said Pete. “Tell him the +Romans are ter'ble jealous chaps, and, if he gets into a public house +for a cup of tay, he's to mind and not take the girls on his knee--the +Romans don't like it.” + +The last time they heard from Philip he was in London. His old pain had +given way; he thought he was nearly well again, but he had come +through a sharp fire. The Governor had been very good--kept open the +Deemstership by some means--also surrounded him with London friends--he +was out every night. Nevertheless, an unseen force was drawing him +home--they might see him soon, or it might be later he had been +six months away, but he felt that it had not been all waste and +interruption--he would return with a new sustaining power. + +This letter could not be answered, for it bore no address. It came by +the night-mail with the same day's steamer from England. Two hours later +Mrs. Gorry ran in from an errand to the town saying-- + +“I believe in my heart I saw Mr. Philip Christian going by on the road.” + +“When?” said Pete. + +“This minute,” she answered. + +“Chut! woman,” said Pete; “the man's in London. Look, here's his +letter”--running his forefinger along the headline--'“London, January +21st--that's yesterday. See!” + +Mrs. Gorry was perplexed. But the next night she was out at the same +hour on the same errand, and came flying into the house with a scared +look, making the same announcement. + +“See for yourself, then,” she cried, “he's going up the lane by the +garden.” + +“Nonsense! it's browning you're ateing with your barley,” said Pete; and +then to Kate, behind his hand, he whispered, “Whisht! It's sights +she's seeing, poor thing--and no wonder, with her husband laving her so +lately.” + +But the third night also Mrs. Gorry returned from a similar errand, at +the same hour, with the same statement. + +“I'm sure of it,” she panted. She was now in terror. An idea of the +supernatural had taken hold of her. + +“The woman manes it,” said Pete, and he began to cross-question her. How +was Mr. Christian dressed? She hadn't noticed that night, but the first +night he had worn a coat like an old Manx cape. Which way was he going? +She couldn't be certain which way to-night but the night before he had +gone up the lane between the chapel and the garden. Had she seen his +face at all? The first time she had seen it, and it was very thin and +pale. + +“Oh, I wouldn't deceave you, sir,” said Mrs. Gorry, and she fell to +crying. + +“Gough bless me, but this is mortal strange, though,” said Pete. + +“What time was it exactly, Jane?” asked Kate. + +“On the minute of ten every night,” answered Mrs. Gorry. + +“Is there any difference in time, now,” said Pete, “between the Isle of +Man and London, Kitty?” + +“Nothing to speak of,” said Kate. + +Pete scratched his head. “I must be putting a sight up on Black Tom. A +dirty old trouss, God forgive me, if he is my grandfather, but he knows +the Manx yarns about right. If it had been Midsummer day now, and Philip +had been in bed somewhere, it might have been his spirit coming home +while he was sleeping to where his heart is--they're telling of the +like, anyway.” + +Kate read the mystery after her own manner, and on the following night, +at the approach of ten o'clock, she went into the parlour of the hall, +whence a window looked out on to the road. The day had been dull and the +night was misty. A heavy white hand seemed to have come down on to the +face of sea and land. Everything lay still and dead and ghostly. Kate +was in the dark room, trembling, but not with fear. Presently a form +that was like a shadow passed under a lamp that glimmered opposite. She +could see only the outlines of a Spanish cape. But she listened for +the footsteps, and she knew them. They came on and paused, came up and +paused again, and then they went past and deadened off and died in the +dense night-air. + +Kate's eyes were red and swollen when she came back to supper. She +had promised herself enjoyment of Philip's sufferings. There was no +enjoyment, but only a cry of yearning from the deep place where love +calls to love. She tried afresh to make the thought of Philip sink to +the lowest depth of her being. It was hard--it was impossible; Pete was +for ever strengthening the recollection of him--of his ways, his +look, his voice, his laugh. What he said was only the echo of her own +thoughts; but it was pain and torment, nevertheless. She felt like +crying, “Let me alone--let me alone!” + +People in the town began to talk of Mrs. Gorry's mysterious stories. + +“Philip will be forced to come now,” thought Kate; and he came. Kate was +alone. It was afternoon; dinner was over, the hearth was swept, the +fire was heaped up, and the rug was down. He entered the porch quietly, +tapped lightly at the door, and stepped into the house. He hoped she +was well. She answered mechanically. He asked after Pete. She replied +vacantly that he had been gone since morning on some fishing business to +Peel. It was a commonplace conversation--brief, cold, almost trivial. +He spoke softly, and stood in the middle of the floor, swinging his soft +hat against his leg. She was standing by the fire, with one hand on the +mantelpiece and her head half aside, looking sideways towards his feet; +but she noticed that his eyes looked larger than before, and that his +voice, though so soft, had a deeper tone. At first she did not remember +to ask him to sit, and when she thought of it she could not do so. The +poor little words would have been a formal recognition of all that had +happened so terribly--that she was mistress in that house, and the wife +of Pete. + + + + +IV. + +They were standing so, in a silence hard to break, harder still to +keep up, when Pete himself came back, like a rush of wind, and welcomed +Philip with both hands. + +“Sit, boy, sit,” he cried; “not that one--this aisy one. Mine? Well, +if it's mine, it's yours. Not had dinner, have you? Neither have I. Any +cold mate left, Kitty? No? Fry us a chop, then, darling.” + +Kate had recovered herself by this time, and she went out on this +errand. While she was away, Pete rattled on like a mill-race--asked +about the travels, laughed about the girls, and roared about Mrs. Gorry +and her ghost of Philip. + +“Been buying a Nickey at Peel to-day, Phil,” he said; “good little +boat--a reg'lar clipper. Aw, I'm going to start on the herrings myself +next sayson sir, and what for shouldn't I? Too many of the Manx ones +are giving the fishing the goby. There's life in the ould dog yet, +though. Would be, anyway, if them rusty Kays would be doing anything for +the industry. They're building piers enough for the trippers, but +never a breakwater the size of a tooth-brush for the fishermen. That's +reminding me, Phil--the boys are at me to get you to petition the +Tynwald Court for better harbours. They're losing many a pound by not +getting out all weathers. But if the child doesn't cry, the mother will +be giving it no breast. So we mane to squall till they think in Douglas +we've got spavined wind or population of the heart, or something. The +men are looking to you, Phil. 'That's the boy for us,' says they. 'He's +stood our friend before, and he'll do it again,' they're saying.” + +Philip promised to draw up the petition, and then Mrs. Gorry came in and +laid the cloth. + +Kate, meanwhile, had been telling herself that she had not done well. +Where was the satisfaction she had promised herself on the night of +her wedding-day, when she had seen Philip from the height of a great +revenge, if she allowed him to think that she also was suffering? She +must be bright, she must be gay, she must seem to be happy and in love +with her husband. + +She returned to the hall-parlour with a smoking dish, and a face all +sunshine. + +“I'm afraid they're not very good, dear,” she said. + +“Chut!” said Pete; “we're not particular. Phil and I have roughed it +before to-day.” + +She laughed merrily, and, under pretext of giving orders, disappeared +again. But she had not belied the food she had set on the table. The +mutton was badly fed, badly killed, badly cut, and, above all, badly +cooked. To eat it was an ordeal. Philip tried hard not to let Pete see +how he struggled. Pete fought valiantly to conceal his own efforts. The +perspiration began to break out on their foreheads. Pete stopped in the +midst of some wild talk to glance up at Philip. Philip tore away with +knife and fork and answered vaguely. Then Pete looked searchingly +around, rose on tiptoe, went stealthily to the kitchen door, came back, +caught up a piece of yellow paper from the sideboard, whipped the chops +into it from his own plate and then from Philip's, and crammed them into +his jacket pocket. + +“No good hurting anybody's feelings,” said he; and then Kate reappeared +smiling. + +“Finished already?” she said with an elevation of pitch. + +“Ha! ha!” laughed Pete. “Two hungry men, Kate! You'd rather keep us a +week than a fortnight, eh?” + +Kate stood over the empty dish with a look of surprise. Pete winked +furiously at Philip. Philip's eyes wandered about the tablecloth. + +“_She_ isn't knowing much about a hungry man's appetite, is she, Phil?” + +“But,” said Kate--“but,” she stammered--“what's become of the bones?” + +Pete scratched his chin through his beard. “The bones? Oh, the bones? +Aw, no, we're not ateing the bones, at all.” Then with a rush, as his +eyes kindled, “But the dog, you see--coorse we always give the bones to +the dog--Dempster's dead on bones.” + +Dempster was lying at the moment full length under the table, snoring +audibly. Mrs. Gorry cleared the cloth, and Kate took up her sewing and +turned towards the sideboard. + +“Has any one seen my pattern?” she asked. + +“Pattern?” said Pete, diving into his jacket-pocket. “D'ye say +pattern,” he muttered, rummaging at his side. “Is this it?” and out +came the yellow paper, crumpled and greasy, which had gone in with the +chops. “Bless me, the stupid a man is now--I took it for a pipe-light.” + +Kate's smile vanished, and she fled out to hide her face. Then Pete +whispered to Philip, “Let's take a slieu round to the 'Plough.'” + +They were leaving the house on that errand when Kate came back to the +hall. “Just taking a lil walk, Kirry,” said Pete. “They're telling me +it's good wonderful after dinner for a wake digestion of the chest,” and +he coughed repeatedly and smote his resounding breast. + +“Wait a moment and I'll go with you,” said Kate. + +There was no help for it. Kate's shopping took them in the direction of +the “Plough.” Old Mrs. Beatty, the innkeeper, was at the door as they +passed, and when she saw Pete approaching on the inside of the three, +she said aloud--meaning no mischief--“Your bread and cheese and porter +are ready, as usual, Capt'n.” + + + + +V. + +The man was killing her. To be his spoiled and adored wife, knowing +she was unworthy of his love and tenderness, was not happiness--it was +grinding misery, bringing death into her soul. If he had blamed her for +her incompetence; if he had scolded her for making his home cheerless; +nay, if he had beaten her, she could have borne with life, and taken her +outward sufferings for her inward punishment. + +She fell into fits of hysteria, sat whole hours listless, with her +feet on the fender. Pete's conduct exasperated her. As time went on and +developed the sweetness of Pete, the man grew more and more distasteful +to her, and she broke into fits of shrewishness. Pete hung his head and +reproached himself. She wasn't to mind if he said things--he was only +a rough fellow. Then she burst into tears and asked him to forgive her, +and he was all cock-a-hoop in a moment, like a dog that is coaxed after +it has been beaten. + +Her sufferings reached a climax--she became conscious that she was about +to become a mother. This affected her with terrible fears. She went +back to that thought of a possible contingency which had torn her with +conflicting feelings on the eve of her marriage. It was impossible to +be sure. The idea might be no more than a morbid fancy, born of her +un-happiness, of her secret love for Philip, of her secret repugnance +for Pete (the inadequate, the uncouth, the uncongenial) but nevertheless +it possessed her with the force of an overpowering conviction, it grew +upon her day by day, it sat on her heart like a nightmare--the child +that was to be born to her was not the child of her husband. + + + + +VI. + +In spite of Pete's invitations, Philip came rarely. He was full +of excuses--work--fresh studies--the Governor--his aunt. Pete said +“Coorse,” and “Sartenly,” and “Wouldn't trust,” until Philip began to +be ashamed, and one evening he came, looking stronger than usual, with a +more sustaining cheerfulness, and plumped into the house with the words, +“I've come at last!” + +“To stay the night?” said Pete. + +“Well, yes,” said Philip. + +“That's lucky and unlucky too, for I'm this minute for Peel with two of +the boys to fetch round my Nickey by the night-tide. But youll stay +and keep the wife company, and I'll be back first tide in the morning. +You'll be obliged to him, won't you, Kate?” he cried, pitching his voice +over his shoulder; and then, in a whisper, “She's a bit down at whiles, +and what wonder, and her so near--but you'll see, you'll see,” and he +winked and nodded knowingly. + +There was no harking back, no sheering off on the score of modesty +before Pete's large faith. Kate looked as if she would cry “Mercy, +mercy!” but when she saw the same appeal on Philip's face she was stung. + +Pete went off, and then Kate and Philip sat down to tea. While tea +lasted it was not hard to fill the silences with commonplaces. After it +was over she brought him a pipe, and they lapsed into difficult pauses. +Philip puffed vigorously and tried to look happy. Kate struggled not to +let Philip see that she was ill at ease. Every moment their imagination +took a new turn. He began to read a book, and while they sat without +speaking she thought it was hardly nice of him to treat her with +indifference. When he spoke she thought he was behaving with less +politeness than before. He went over to the piano and they sang a part +song, “Oh, who will o'er the downs so free?” Their voices went well +enough together, but they broke down. The more they tried to forget +the past the more they remembered it. He twiddled the backs of his +fingertips over the keyboard; she swung on one foot and held to the +candle-bracket while they talked of Pete. That name seemed to fortify +them against the scouts of passion. Pete was their bulwark. It was the +old theme, but played as a tragedy, not as a comedy, now. + +“It is delightful to see you settled in this beautiful home,” he said. + +“_Isn't_ it beautiful?” she answered. + +“You ought to be very happy.” + +“Why should I not be happy?” with a little laugh. + +“Why, indeed? A home like a nest and a husband that worships you-----” + +She laughed again because she could not speak. Speech was thin gauze, +laughter was rolling smoke; so she laughed and laughed. + +“What a fine hearty creature he is!” said Philip. + +“Isn't he?” said Kate. + +“Education and intellect don't always go together.” + +“Any wife might love such a husband,” said Kate. + +“So simple, so natural, so unsuspicious-----” + +But that was coming to quarters too close, so they fell back on silence. +The silence was awful; the power of it was pitiless. If they could have +spoken the poorest commonplaces, the spell might have dissolved. Philip +thought he would rise, but he could not do so. Kate tried to turn away, +but felt herself rooted to the spot. With faces aside, they remained +some moments where they were, as if a spirit had passed between them. + +Mrs. Gorry came in to lay the supper, and then Kate recovered herself. +She got back her power of laughter, and laughed at everything. He was +not deceived. “She loves me still,” said the voice of his heart. He +hated himself for the thought, but it haunted him with a merciless +persistence. He remembered the evening of the wedding-day, and the +imploring look she gave him on going away with Pete; and he returned to +the idea that she had been married under the compulsion of her father, +Cæsar, the avaricious hypocrite. He told himself it would be easy to +kindle a new fire on the warm hearth. As she laughed and he looked into +her beautiful eyes and caught the nervous twitch of her mouth, he felt +something of the old thrill, the old passion, the old unconditioned love +of her who loved him in spite of all, and merely because she must. But +no! Had he spent six months abroad for nothing? He would be strong; he +would be loyal. If need be he would save this woman from herself. + +At last Kate lit a candle and said, “I must show you to your room.” + +She talked cheerily going upstairs. On the landing she opened the door +of the room above the hall, and went into it, and drew down the blind. +She was still full of good spirits, said perhaps he had no night-shirt, +so she had left out one of Pete's, hoped he would find it big enough, +and laughed again. He took the candle from her at the threshold, and +kissed the hand that had held it. She stood a moment quivering like a +colt, then she bounded away; there was the clash of a door somewhere +beyond, and Kate was in her own room, kneeling before the bed with +her face buried in the counterpane to stifle the sobs that might break +through the walls. + +Under all her lightness, in spite of all her laughter, the old +tormenting thought had been with her still. Should she tell him? Could +he understand? Would he believe? If he realised the gravity of the awful +position in which she was soon to be placed, would he make an effort to +extricate her? And if he did not, would not, could not, should not she +hate him for ever after? Then the old simple love, the pure passion, +came hack upon her at the sight of his face, at the touch of his hand, +at the sound of his voice? Oh, for what might have been--what might have +been! + +Pete's Nickey came into harbour with the morning tide, and the three +breakfasted together. As Kate moved heavily in front of the fire, Pete +crowed, cooed, and scattered wise winks round the table. + +“More milk, mammy,” he whimpered, and then he imitated all kinds of baby +prattle. + +After breakfast the men smoked, and Kate took up her sewing. She +was occupying herself with the little labours, so pretty, so full of +delicate humour and delicious joy, which usually open a new avenue for +a woman's tenderness. Philip's eyes fell on her, and she dropped below +into her lap the tiny piece of white linen she was working on. Pete +saw this, stole to the back of her chair, reached over her shoulder, +snatched the white thing out of her fingers, held it outstretched in +his ponderous hands, and roared like a smithy bellows. It was a baby's +shirt. + +“Never mind, darling,” he coaxed, as the colour leapt to Kate's face. +“Philip must be a sort of a father to the boy some day--a godfather, +anyway--so he won't mind seeing his lil shiff. We must be calling him +Philip, too. What do you say, Kirry--Philip, is it agreed?” + + + + +VII. + +As her time drew near, the conviction deepened upon her that she could +not be confined in her husband's house. Being there at such a crisis was +like living in a volcanic land. One false step, one passionate impulse, +and the very earth under her feet would split. “I must go home for +awhile, Pete,” she said. + +“Coorse you must,” said Pete. “Nobody like the ould angel when a girl's +that way.” + +Pete took her back to her mother's in the gig, driving very slowly, +and lifting her up and down as tenderly as if she had been a child. She +breathed freely when she left Elm Cottage, but when she was settled +in her own bedroom at “The Manx Fairy” she realised that she had only +stepped from misery to misery. So many memories lived like ghosts +there--memories of innocent slumbers, and of gleeful awakenings amid the +twittering of birds and the rattling of gravel. The old familiar place, +the little room with the poor little window looking out on the orchard, +the poor little bed with its pink curtains like a tent, the sweet +old blankets, the wash-basin, the press, the blind with the same +old pattern, the sheepskin rug underfoot, the whitewashed scraas +overhead--everything the same, but, O God! how different! + +“Let me look at myself in the glass, Nancy,” she said, and Nancy gave +her the handglass which had been cracked the morning after the Melliah. + +She pushed it away peevishly. “What's the use of a thing like that?” she +said. + +Pete haunted the house day and night. There was no bed for him there, +and he was supposed to go home to sleep. But he wandered away in the +darkness over the Curragh to the shore, and in the grey of morning he +was at the door again, bringing the cold breath of the dawn into the +house with the long whisper round the door ajar. “How's she going on +now?” + +The women bundled him out bodily, and then he hung about the roads like +a dog disowned. If he heard a sigh from the dairy loft, he sat down +against the gable and groaned. Grannie tried to comfort him. “Don't +be taking on so, boy. It'll be all joy soon,” said she, “and you'll be +having the child to shew for it.” + +But Pete was bitter and rebellious. “Who's wanting the child anyway?” + said he. “It's only herself I'm wanting; and she's laving me; O Lord, +she's laving me. God forgive me!” he muttered. “O good God, forgive +me!” he groaned: “It isn't fair, though. Lord knows it isn't fair,” he +mumbled hoarsely. + +At last Nancy Joe came out and took him in hand in earnest. + +“Look here, Pete,” she said. “If you're wanting to kill the woman, and +middling quick too, you'll go on the way you're going. But if you don't, +you'll be taking to the road, and you won't be coming back till you're +wanted.” + +This settled Pete's restlessness. The fishing had begun early that +season, and he went off for a night to the herrings. + +Kate waited long, and the women watched her with trembling. “It's a week +or two early,” said one. “The weather's warm,” said another. “The boghee +millish! She's a bit soon,” said Grannie. + +There was less of fear in Kate's own feelings. + +“Do women often die?” she asked. + +“The proportion is small,” said the doctor. + +Half an hour afterwards she spoke again. + +“Does the child sometimes die?” + +“Well, I've known it to happen, but only when the mother has had a +shock--lost her husband, for example.” + +She lay tossing on the bed, wishing for her own death, hoping for the +death of the unborn child, dreading its coming lest she should hate and +loathe it. At last came the child's first cry--that cry out of silence +that had never broken on the air before, but was henceforth to be one of +the world's voices for laughter and for weeping, for joy and for sorrow, +to her who had borne it into life. Then she called to them to show her +the baby, and when they did so, bringing it up with soft cooings and +foolish words, she searched the little wrinkled face with a frightened +look, then put up her arms to shut out the sight, and cried “Take it +away,” and turned to the wall. Her vague fear was a certainty now; the +child was the child of her sin--she was a bad woman. + +Yet there is no shame, no fear, no horror, but the pleading of a +new-born babe can drown its clamour. The child cried again, and the +cruel battle of love and dread was won for motherhood. The mother heart +awoke and swelled. She had got her baby, at all events. It was all she +had for all she had suffered; but it was enough, and a dear and precious +prize. + +“Are you sure it is well?” she asked. “Quite, quite well? Doesn't its +little face look as if its mammy had been crying--no?” + +“'Deed no,” said Grannie, “but as bonny a baby as ever was born.” + +The women were scurrying up and down, giggling on the landings, laughing +on the stairs, and saying _hush_ at their own noises as they crept into +the room. In a fretful whimper the child was still crying, and Grannie +was telling it, with many wags of the head and in a mighty stern voice, +that they were going to have none of its complaining now that it _had_ +come at last; and Kate Herself, with hands clasped together, was saying +in a soft murmur like a prayer, “God is very good, and the doctor is +good too. God is good to give us doctors.” + +“Lie quiet, and I'll come back in an hour or two,” said Dr. Mylechreest +from half-way through the door. + +“Dear heart alive, what will the father say?” cried Grannie, and then +the whole place broke into that smile of surprise which comes to every +house after the twin angels of Life and Death have brooded long over its +roof-tree, and are gone at length before the face of a little child. + + + + +VIII. + +When Pete came up to the quay in the raw sunshine of early morning, John +the Clerk, mounted on a barrel, was selling by auction the night's take +of the boats. + +“I've news for you, Mr. Quilliam,” he cried, as Pete's boat, with half +sail set, dropped down the harbour. Pete brought to, leapt ashore, and +went up to where John, at the end of the jetty, surrounded by a crowd of +buyers in little spring-carts, was taking bids for the fish. + +“One moment, Capt'n,” he cried, across his outstretched arm, at the end +whereof was a herring with gills still opening and closing. “Ten maise +of this sort for the last lot, well fed, alive and kicking--how much for +them? Five shillings? Thank you--and three, Five and three. It's in it +yet, boys--only five and three--and six, thank _you_. It'll do no harm +at five and six--six shillings? All done at six--_and six?_ All done at +six and six?” “Seven shillings,” shouted somebody with a voice like +a foghorn. “They're Annie the Cadger's,” said John, dropping to the +ground. “And now, Capt'n Quilliam, we'll go and wet the youngster's +head.” + +Pete went up to Sulby like an avalanche, shouting his greetings to +everybody on the way. But when he got near to the “Fairy,” he wiped his +steaming forehead and held his panting breath, and pretended not to have +heard the news. + +“How's the poor girl now?” he said in a meek voice, trying to look +powerfully miserable, and playing his part splendidly for thirty +seconds. + +Then the women made eyes at each other and looked wondrous knowing, +and nodded sideways at Pete, and clucked and chuckled, saying, “Look at +him,--_he_ doesn't know anything, does he?” “Coorse not, woman--these +men creatures are no use for nothing.” + +“Out of a man's way,” cried Pete, with a roar, and he made a rush for +the stairs. + +Nancy blocked him at the foot of them with both hands on his shoulders. +“You'll be quiet, then,” she whispered. “You were always a rasonable +man, Pete, and she's wonderful wake--promise you'll be quiet.” + +“TO be like a mouse,” said Pete, and he whipped off his long sea-boots +and crept on tiptoe into the room. + +There she lay with the morning light on her, and a face as white as the +quilt that she was plucking with her long fingers. + +“Thank God for a living mother and a living child,” said Pete, in a +broken gurgle, and then he drew down the bedclothes a very little, and +there, too, was the child on the pillow of her other arm. + +Then do what he would to be quiet, he could not help but make a shout. + +“He's there! Yes, he is! He is, though! Joy! Joy!” + +The women were down on him like a flock of geese. “Out of this, sir, if +you can't behave better!' + +“Excuse me, ladies,” said Pete humbly, “I'm not in the habit of babies. +A bit excited, you see, Mistress Nancy, ma'am. Couldn't help putting a +bull of a roar out, not being used of the like.” Then, turning back to +the bed, “Aw, Kitty, the beauty it is, though! And the big! As big as +my fist already. And the fat! It's as fat as a bluebottle. And the +straight! Well, not so _very_ straight, neither, but the complexion at +him now! Give him to me, Kitty I give him to me, the young rascal. Let +me have a hould of him, anyway.” + +“_Him_, indeed! Listen to the man,” said Nancy. + +“It's a girl, Pete,” said Grannie, lifting the child out of the bed. + +“A girl, is it?” said Pete doubtfully. “Well,” he said, with a wag of +the head, “thank God for a girl.” Then, with another and more resolute +wag, “Yes, thank God for a living mother and a living child, if it is a +girl,” and he stretched out his arms to take the baby. + +“Aisy, now, Pete--aisy,” said Grannie, holding it out to him. + +“Is it aisy broke they are, Grannie?” said Pete. A good spirit looked +out of his great boyish face. “Come to your ould daddie, you lil +sandpiper. Gough bless me, Kitty, the weight of him, though! This +child's a quarter of a hundred if he's an ounce. He is, I'll go bail he +is. Look at him! Guy heng, Grannie, did ye ever see the like, now! It's +absolute perfection. Kitty, I couldn't have had a better one if I'd +chiced it. Where's that Tom Hommy now? The bleating little billygoat, he +was bragging outrageous about his new baby--saying he wouldn't part with +it for two of the best cows in his cow-house. This'll floor him, I'm +thinking. What's that you're saying, Mistress Nancy, ma'am? No good for +nothing, am I? You were right, Grannie. 'It'll be all joy soon,' you +were saying, and haven't we the child to show for it? I put on my +stocking inside out on Monday, ma'am. 'I'm in luck,' says I, and so I +was. Look at that, now! He's shaking his lil fist at his father. He is, +though. This child knows me. Aw, you're clever, Nancy, but--no nonsense +at all, Mistress Nancy, ma'am. Nothing will persuade me but this child +knows me.” + +“Do you hear the man?” said Nancy. “_He_ and _he_, and _he_ and _he!_ +It's a girl, I'm telling you; a girl--a girl--a girl.” + +“Well, well, a girl, then--a girl we'll make it,” said Pete, with +determined resignation. + +“He's deceaved,” said Grannie. “It was a boy he was wanting, poor +fellow!” + +But Pete scoffed at the idea. “A boy? Never! No, no--a girl for your +life. I'm all for girls myself, eh, Kitty? Always was, and now I've got +two of them.” + +The child began to cry, and Grannie took it back and rocked it, face +downwards, across her knees. + +“Goodness me, the voice at him!” said Pete. “It's a skipper he's born +for--a harbour-master, anyway.” + +The child slept, and Grannie put it on the pillow turned lengthwise at +Kate's side. + +“Quiet as a Jenny Wren, now,” said Pete. “Look at the bogh smiling in +his sleep. Just like a baby mermaid on the egg of a dogfish. But where's +the ould man at all? Has he seen it? We must have it in the papers. The +_Times?_Yes, and the 'Tiser too. 'The beloved wife of Mr. Capt'n Peter +Quilliam, of a boy--a girl,' I mane. Aw, the wonder there'll be all +the island over--everybody getting to know. Newspapers are like +women--ter'ble bad for keeping sacrets. What'll Philip say? But haven't +you a toothful of anything, Grannie? Gin for the ladies, Nancy. Goodness +me, the house is handy. What time was it? Wait, don't tell me! It was +five o'clock this morning, wasn't it? Yes? Gough bless me, I knew it! +High water to the very minute--aw, he'll rise in the world, and die at +the top of the tide. How did I know when the child was born, ma'am? As +aisy as aisy. We were lying adrift of Cronk ny Irrey Lhaa, looking up +for daylight by the fisherman's clock. Only light enough to see the +black of your nail, ma'am. All at once I heard a baby's cry on the +waters. 'It's the nameless child of Earey Cushin,' sings out one of the +boys. 'Up with the clout,' says I. And when we were hauling the nets +and down on our knees saying a bit of a prayer, as usual, 'God bless my +new-born child,' says I, 'and God bless my child's mother, too,' I says, +and God love and protect them always, and keep and presarve myself as +well.'” There was a low moaning from the bed. + +“Air! Give me air! Open the door!” Kate gasped. + +“The room is getting too hot for her,” said Grannie. + +“Come, there's one too many of us here,” said Nancy. “Out of it,” and +she swept Pete from the bedroom with her apron as if he had been a drove +of ducks. + +Pete glanced backward from the door, and a cloak that was hanging on the +inside of it brushed his face. + +“God bless her!” he said in a low tone. “God bless and reward her for +going through this for me!” + +Then he touched the cloak with his lips and disappeared. A moment later +his curly black poll came stealing round the door jamb, half-way down, +like the head of a big boy. + +“Nancy,” in a whisper, “put the tongs over the cradle; it's a pity to +tempt the fairies. And, Grannie, I wouldn't lave it alone to go out to +the cow-house--the lil people are shocking bad for changing.” + +Kate, with her face to the wall, listened to him with an aching heart. +As Pete went down the doctor returned. + +“She's hardly so well,” said the doctor. “Better not let her nurse the +child. Bring it up by hand. It will be best for both.” + +So it was arranged that Nancy should be made nurse and go to Elm +Cottage, and that Mrs. Gorry should come in her place to Sulby. + +Throughout four-and-twenty hours thereafter, Kate tried her utmost to +shut her heart to the child. At the end of that time, being left some +minutes alone with the little one, she was heard singing to it in a +sweet, low tone. Nancy paused with the long brush in her hand in the +kitchen, and Granny stopped at her knitting in the bar. + +“That's something like, now,” said Nancy. + +“Poor thing, poor Kirry! What wonder if she was a bit out of her head, +the bogh, and her not well since her wedding?” + +They crept upstairs together at the unaccustomed sounds, and found Pete, +whom they had missed, outside the bedroom door, half doubled up and +holding his breath to listen. + +“Hush!” said he, less with his tongue than with his mouth, which he +pursed out to represent the sound. Then he whispered, “She's filling all +the room with music. Listen! It's as good as fairy music in Glentrammon. +And it's the little fairy itself that's 'ticing it out of her.” + +Next day Philip came, and nothing would serve for Pete but that he +should go up to see the child. + +“It's only Phil,” he said, through the doorway, dragging Philip into +Kate's room after him, for the familiarity that a great joy permits +breaks down conventions. Kate did not look up, and Philip tried to +escape. + +“He's got good news for himself, too” said Pete. “They're to be making +him Dempster a month to-morrow.” + +Then Kate lifted her eyes to Philip's face, and all the glory of success +withered under her gaze. He stumbled downstairs, and hurried away. There +was the old persistent thought, “She loves me still,” but it was working +now, in the presence of the child, with how great a difference! When he +looked at the little, downy face, a new feeling took possession of him. +Her child--hers--that might have been his also! Had his bargain been +worth having? Was any promotion in the world to be set against one throb +of Pete's simple joy, one gleam of the auroral radiance that lights up +a poor man's home when he is first a father, one moment of divine +partnership in the babe that is fresh from God? + +Three weeks later, Pete took his wife home in Cæsar's gig. Everything +was the same, as when he brought her, save that within the shawls with +which she was wrapped about the child now lay with its pink eyelids +to the sky, and its fiat white bottle against her breast. It was a +beautiful spring morning, and the young sunlight was on the sallies of +the Curragh and the gold of the roadside gorse. Pete was as silly as +a boy, and he chirped and croaked all the way home like every bird and +beast of heaven and earth. When they got to Elm Cottage, he lifted his +wife down as tenderly as if she had been the babe she had in her arms. +He was strong and she was light, and he half helped, half carried her to +the porch door. Nancy was there to take the child out of her hands, and, +as she did so, Pete, back at the horse's head, cried, “That's the +last bit of furniture the house was waiting for, Nancy. What's a house +without a child? Just a room without a clock.” + +“Clock, indeed,” said Nancy; “clocks are stopping, but this one's for +going like a mill.” + +“Don't be tempting the Nightman, Nancy,” cried Pete; but he was full of +childlike delight. + +Kate stepped inside. The fire burned in the hall parlour, the fire-irons +shone like glass, there were sprigs of fuchsia-bud in the ornaments on +the chimneypiece--everything was warm and cheerful and homelike. She sat +down without taking off her hat. “Why can't I be quiet and happy?” she +thought. “Why can't I make myself love him and forget?” + +But she was like one who traversed a desert under the sea--a vast +submerged Sahara. Over her head was all her life, with all her love +and all her happiness, and the things around her were only the ghostly +shadows cast by them. + + + + +IX. + +The more Kate realised that she was in the position of a bad woman, the +more she struggled to be a good one. She flew to religion as a refuge. +There was no belief in her religion, no faith, no creed, no mystical +transports, but only fear, and shame, and contrition. It was fervent +enough, nevertheless. On Sunday morning she went to The Christians, on +Sunday afternoon to church, on Sunday evening to the Wesleyan chapel, +and on Wednesday night to the mission-house of the Primitives. Her +catholicity did not please her father. He looked into her quivering +face, and asked if she had broken any commandment in secret. She turned +pale, and answered “No.” + +Pete followed her wherever she went, and, seeing this, some of the baser +sort among the religious people began to follow him. They abused each +other badly in their efforts to lay hold of his money-bags. “You'll +never go over to yonder lot,” said one. “They're holding to election--a +soul-destroying doctrine.” “A respectable man can't join himself to +Cowley's gang,” said another. “They're denying original sin, and aren't +a ha'p'orth better than infidels.” + +Pete took the measure of them all, down to the watch-pockets of their +waistcoats. + +“You remind me,” said he, “when you're a-gate on your doctrines, of +the Kaffirs out at Kimberley. If one of them found an ould hat in the +compound that some white man had thrown away, they'd light a camp-fire +after dark, and hould a reg'lar Tynwald Coort on it. There they'd be +squatting round on their haunches, with nothing to be seen of them but +their eyes and their teeth, and there'd be as many questions as the +Catechism. '_Who_ found it!' says one. '_Where_ did he find it?' says +another. 'If _he_ hadn't found it, who else would have found it?' That's +how they'd be going till two in the morning, and the fire dead out, +and the lot of them squealing away same as monkeys in the dark. And all +about an ould hat with a hole in it, not worth a ha'penny piece.” + +“Blasphemy,” they cried. “But still and for all, you give to the widow +and lend to the Lord--you practise the religion you don't believe in, +Cap'n Quilliam.” + +“There's a pair of us, then.” said Pete, “for you believe in the +religion you don't practise.” + +But Cæsar got Pete at last, in spite of his scepticism. The time came +for the annual camp-meeting. Kate went off to it, and Pete followed +like a big dog at her heels. The company assembled at Sulby Bridge, and +marched through the village to a revival chorus. They stopped at a field +of Cæsar's in the glen--it was last year's Melliah field--and Cæsar +mounted a cart which had been left there to serve as a pulpit. Then they +sang again, and, breaking up into many companies, went off into little +circles that were like gorse rings on the mountains. After that they +reassembled to the strains of another chorus, and gathered afresh about +the cart for Cæsar's sermon. + +It dealt with the duty of sinless perfection. There were evil men and +happy sinners in the island these days, who were telling them it was not +good to be faultless in this life, because virtue begot pride, and pride +was a deadly sin. There were others who were saying that because a man +must repent in order to be saved, to repent he had to sin. Doctrines of +the devil--don't listen to them. Could a man in the household of faith +live one second without committing sin? Of course he could. One minute? +Certainly. One hour? No doubt of it. Then, if a man could live one hour +without sin, he could live one day, one week, one month, one year--nay, +a whole lifetime. + +In getting thus far, Cæsar had worked himself into a perspiration, and +he took off his coat, hung it over the cartwheel, and went on in his +shirt-sleeves. Let them make no excuses for backsliders. It was a trick +of the devil to deal with you, and forget to pay strap (the price). It +was an old rule and a good one that, if any were guilty of the sins of +the flesh, they should be openly punished in this world, that their sins +might not be counted against them in the day of the Lord. + +Cæsar threw off his waistcoat and finished with a passionate +exhortation, calling upon his hearers to deliver themselves of secret +sins. If oratory is to be judged of by its effects, Cæsar's sermon was +a great oration. It began amid the silence of his own followers, and the +_tschts_ and _pshaws_ of a little group of his enemies, who lounged on +the outside of the crowd to cast ridicule on the “swaddler” and the +“publican preacher.” But it ended amid loud exclamations of praise and +supplications from all his hearers, sighing and groaning, and the bodily +clutching of one another by the arm in paroxysms of fear and rapture. + +When Cæsar's voice died down like a wave of the sea, somebody leapt up +from the grass to pray. And before the first prayer had ended, a second +was begun. Meantime the penitents had begun to move inward through the +throng, and they fell weeping and moaning on their knees about the cart. +Kate was among them, and, when she took her place, Pete still held by +her side A strong shuddering passed over her shoulders, and her wet eyes +were on the grass. Pete took her hand, and feeling how it trembled, his +own eyes also filled. Above their heads Cæsar was towering with fiery +eyes and face aflame. In a momentary pause between two prayers, he +tossed his voice up in a hymn. The people joined him at the second bar, +and then the wailing of the penitents was drowned in a general shout of +the revival tune-- + + “If some poor wandering child of Thine + Have spurned to-day the voice divine, + Now, Lord, the gracious work begin, + Let him no more lie down in sin.” + +Kate sobbed aloud--poor vessel of human passions tossed about, tormented +by the fire that was consuming her. + +As the penitents grew calmer, they rose one by one to give their +experience of Satan and salvation. At length Cæsar seized his +opportunity and said, “And now Brother Quilliam will give us his +experience.” + +Pete rose from Kate's side with tearful eyes amid a babel of jubilation, +most of it facetious. “Be of good cheer, Peter, be not afraid.” + +“I've not much to tell,” said Pete--“only a story of backsliding. +Before I earned enough to carry me up country, I worked a month at Cape +Town with the boats. My master was a pious old Dutchman getting the name +of Jan. One Saturday night a big ship lost her anchor outside, and on +Sunday morning forty pounds was offered for finding it. All the boatmen +went out except Jan. 'Six days shalt thou labour,' says he, 'but the +seventh is the Sabbath.'” + +Pete's address was here punctuated by loud cries of thanksgiving. + +“All day long he was seeing the boats beating up the bay, so, to keep +out of temptation, he was going up to the bedroom and pulling the blind +and getting down on his knees and wrastling like mad. And something out +of heaven was saying to him, 'It's the Lord's day, Jannie; they'll not +get a ha'p'orth.' Neither did they; but when Jan's watch said twelve +o'clock midnight the pair of us were going off like rockets. Well, we +hadn't been ten minutes on the water before our grapplings had hould of +that anchor.” + +There were loud cries of “Glory!” + +“Jan was shouting, 'The Lord has put us atop of it as straight as the +lid of a taypot!'” + +Great cries of “Hallelujah!” + +“But when we came ashore we found Jan's watch was twenty minutes fast, +and that was the end of the ould man's religion.” + +That day the word went round that both Pete and Kate had been converted. +Their names were entered in Class, and they received their quarterly +tickets. + + + + +X. + +Next morning Kate set out to church for her churching. Her household +duties had lost their interest by this time, and she left Nancy to cook +the dinner. Pete had volunteered to take charge of the child. This he +began to do by establishing himself with his pipe in an armchair by the +cradle, and looking steadfastly down into it until the little one awoke. +Then he rocked it, rummaged his memory for a nursery song to quiet it, +and smoked and sang together. + + “A frog he would a-wooing go, + _Kitty alone, Kitty alone_, + (Puff, puff.) + A wonderful likely sort of a beau, + _Kitty alone and I!_” + (_Puff, puff, puff_.) + +The sun was shining in at the doorway, and a man's shadow fell across +the cradle-head. It was Philip. Pete put his mouth out into the form of +an unspoken “Hush,” and Philip sat down in silence, while Pete went on +with his smoke and his song. + + “But when her husband rat came home, + _Kitty alone, Kitty alone_, + Pray who's been here since I've been gone? + _Kitty alone and I!_” _(Puff, Puff)_ + +Pete had got to the middle of the verse about “the worthy gentleman,” + when the low whine in the cradle lengthened to a long breath and +stopped. + +“Gone off at last, God bless it,” said Pete. “And how's yourself, +Philip? And how goes the petition?” + +With his head on his hand, Philip was gazing absently into the fire, and +he did not hear. + +“How goes the petition?” said Pete. + +“It was that I came to speak of,” said Philip. “Sorry to say it has had +no effect but a bad one. It has only drawn attention to the fact that +Manx fishermen pay no harbour dues.” + +“And right too,” said Pete. “The harbours are our fathers' harbours, and +were freed to us forty years ago.” + +“Nevertheless,” said Philip, “the dues are to be demanded. The Governor +has issued an order.” + +“Then we'll rise against it--every fisherman in the island,” said Pete. +“And when they're making you Dempster, you'll back us up in the Tynwald +Coort.” + +“Take care, Pete, take care,” said Philip. + +Then Kate came in from church, and Pete welcomed her with a shout. +Philip rose and bowed in silence. The marks of the prayers of the week +were on her face, but they had brought her no comfort. She had been +constantly promising herself consolation from religion, but every fresh +exercise of devotion had seemed to tear open the wound from which she +bled to death. + +She removed her cloak and stepped to the cradle. The child was sleeping +peacefully, but she convinced herself that it must be unwell. Her own +hands were cold and moist, and when she touched the child she thought +its skin was clammy. Presently her hands became hot and dry, and when +she touched the child again she thought its forehead was feverish. + +“I'm sure she's ill,” she said. + +“Chut! love,” said Pete; “no more ill than I am.” + +But, to calm her fears, he went off for the doctor. The doctor was away +in the country, and was not likely to be back for hours. Kate's fears +increased. Every time she looked at the child she applied to it the +symptoms of her own condition. + +“My child is dying--I'm sure it is,” she cried. + +“Nonsense, darling,” said Pete. “Only an hour ago it was looking up as +imperent as a tomtit.” + +At last a new terror seized her, and she cried, “My child is dying +unbaptized.” + +“Well, we'll soon mend that, love,” said Pete. “I'll be going off for +the parson.” And he caught up his hat and went out. + +He called on Parson Quiggin, who promised to follow immediately. Then he +went on to Sulby to fetch Cæsar and Grannie and some others, having no +fear for the child's life, but some hope of banishing Kate's melancholy +by the merriment of a christening feast. + +Meanwhile, Philip and Kate were alone with the little one, save in the +intervals of Nancy's coming and going between the hall and the kitchen. +She was restless, and full of expectation, starting at every sound and +every step. He could see that she had gone whole nights without sleep, +and was passing through an existence that was burning itself away. + +Do what he would to explain her sufferings as the common results of +childbirth, he could not help resolving them in the old flattering +solution. She was paying the penalty of having married the wrong man. +And she was to blame. Whatever the compulsion put upon her, she ought to +have withstood it. There was no situation in life from which it was +not possible to escape. Had _he_ not found a way out of a situation +essentially the same? Thus a certain high pride in his own conduct took +possession of him even in the presence of Kate's pain. + +But his tenderness fought with his self-righteousness. He looked at her +piteous face and his strength almost ebbed away. She looked up into his +eyes and affectionate pity almost overwhelmed him. Once or twice she +seemed about to say something, but she did not speak, and he said +little. Yet it wanted all his resolution not to take her in his arms and +comfort her, not to mingle his tears with hers, not to tell her of six +months spent in vain in the effort to wipe her out of his heart, not +to whisper of cheerless days and of nights made desolate with the +repetition of her name. But no, he would be stronger than that. It was +not yet too late to walk the path of honour. He would stand no longer +between husband and wife. + +Pete came back, bringing Grannie and Cæsar. The parson arrived soon +after them. Kate was sitting with the child in her lap, and brooding +over it like a bird above its nest. The child was still sleeping the +sleep of health and innocence, but the mother's eyes were wild. + +“Bogh, bogh!” said Grannie, and she kissed her daughter. Kate made no +response. Nancy Joe grew red about the eyelids and began to blow her +nose. + +“Here's the prazon, darling,” whispered Pete, and Kate rose to her feet. +The company rose with her, and stood in a half-circle before the fire. +It was now between daylight and dark, and the firelight flashed in their +faces. + +“Are the godfather and godmothers present?” the parson asked. + +“Mr. Christian will stand godfather, parzon; and Nancy and Grannie will +be godmothers.” + +Nancy took the child out of Kate's arms, and the service for private +baptism began with the tremendous words, “Dearly beloved, forasmuch as +all men are conceived and born in si----” + +The parson stopped. Kate had staggered and almost fallen. Pete put his +arm around her to keep her up, and then the service went on. + +Presently the parson turned to Philip with a softening voice and an +inclination of the head. + +“Dost thou, in the name of this child, renounce the devil and all his +works, the vain pomp and glory of the world, with all covetous desires +of 'the same, and the carnal desires of the flesh, so that thou wilt not +follow nor be led by them?” + +And Philip answered, in a firm, low voice, “I renounce them all.” + +The parson took the child from Nancy. “Name this child.” + +Nancy looked at Kate, but Kate, who was breathing violently, gave no +sign. + +“Kate,” whispered Pete; “Kate, of coorse.” + +“Katherine,” said Nancy, and in that name the child was baptized. + +Dr. Mylechreest came in as the service ended. Grannie held little +Katherine up to him, and he controlled his face and looked at her. + +“There's not much amiss with the child,” he said. + +“I knew it,” shouted Pete. + +“But perhaps the mother is a little weak and nervous,” he added quietly. + +“Coorse she is, the bogh,” cried Pete. + +“Let her see more company,” said the doctor. + +“She shall,” said Pete. + +“If that doesn't do, send her away for awhile.” + +“I will.” + +“Fresh scenes, fresh society; out of the island, by preference.” + +“I'm willing.” + +“She'll come back another woman.” + +“I'll put up with the same one,” said Pete; and, while the company +laughed, he flung open the door, and cried “Come in!” and half a dozen +men who had been waiting outside trooped into the hall. They entered +with shy looks because of the presence of great people. + +“Now for a pull of jough, Nancy,” cried Pete. + +“Not too much excitement either,” said the doctor, and with that warning +he departed. The parson went with him. Philip had slipped out first, +unawares to anybody. Grannie carried little Katherine to the kitchen, +and bathed her before the fire. Kate was propped up with pillows in the +armchair in the corner. Then Nancy brought the ale, and Pete welcomed it +with a shout. Cæsar looked alarmed and rose to go. + +“The drink's your own, sir,” said Pete; “stop and taste it.” + +But Cæsar couldn't stay; it would scarcely be proper. + +“You don't christen your first granddaughter every day,” said Pete. +“Enjoy yourself while you're alive, sir; you'll be a long time dead.” + +Cæsar disappeared, but the rest of the company took Pete's counsel, and +began to make themselves comfortable. + +“The last christening I was at was yesterday,” said John the Clerk. “It +was Christian Killip's little one, before she was married, and it took +the water same as any other child.” + +“The last christening I was at was my own,” said Black Tom, “when I was +made an in inheriter, but I've never inherited yet.” + +“That's truth enough,” said an asthmatic voice from the backstairs. + +“Well, the last christening I was at was at Kimberley,” said Pete, +“and I was the parzon myself that day. Yes, though, Parzon Pete. And +godfather and godmother as well, and the baby was Peter Quilliam, too. +Aw, it was no laughing matter at all. There's always a truck of women +about a compound, hanging on to the boys like burrs. Dirty little +trousses of a rule, but human creatures for all. One of them had a child +by somebody, and then she came to die, and couldn't take rest because it +hadn't been christened. There wasn't a pazon for fifty miles, anywhere, +and it was night-time, too, and the woman was stretched by the camp-fire +and sinking. 'What's to be done?' says the men. _I'll_ do it,' says I, +and I did. One of the fellows got a breakfast can of water out of the +river, and I dipped my hand in it. 'What's the name,' says I; but the +poor soul was too far gone for spaking. So I gave the child my own name, +though I didn't know the mother from Noah's aunt, and the big chaps +standing round bareheaded began to blubber like babies. 'I baptize thee, +Peter Quilliam, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the +Holy Ghost, Amen.' Then the girl died happy and aisy, and what for +shouldn't she? The words were the same, and the water was the same, and +if the hand wasn't as clane as usual, maybe Him that's above wouldn't +bother about the diff'rance.” + +Kate got up with a flush on her cheeks. The room had become too close. +Pete helped her into the parlour, where a bright fire was burning, then +propped and wrapped her up afresh, and, at her own entreaty, returned to +his guests. The company had increased by this time, and there were women +and girls among them. They went on to sing and to playt and at last to +dance. + +Kate heard them. Through the closed door between the hall and the +parlour their merriment came to her. At intervals Pete put in his head, +brimming over with laughter, and cried in a loud whisper, “Did you hear +that, Kate? It's rich!” + +At length Philip came, too, with his hat in one hand and a cardboard box +in the other. “The godfather's present to little Katherine,” he said. + +Kate opened the lid, and drew out a child's hood in scarlet plush. + +“You are very good,” she said vacantly. + +“Don't let us talk of goodness,” he answered; and he turned to go. + +“Wait,” she faltered. “I have something to say to you. Shut the door.” + + + + +XI. + +Philip turned pale. “What is it?” he asked. + +She tried to speak, but at first she could not. + +“Are you unhappy, Kate?” he faltered. + +“Can't you see?” she answered. + +He sat down by the fire, and leaned his face on his hands. “Yes, we have +both suffered,” he said, in a low tone. + +“Why did you let me marry him?” + +Philip raised his head. “How could I have hindered you?” + +“How? Do you ask me how?” She spoke with some bitterness, but he +answered quietly. + +“I tried, Kate, but I could do nothing. You seemed determined. Do what +I would to prevent, to delay, to stop your marriage altogether, the more +you hastened and hurried it. Then I thought to myself, Well, perhaps +it is best. She is trying to forget and forgive, and begin again. What +right have I to stand in her way? Haven't I wronged her enough already? +A good man offers her his love, and she is taking it. Let her do so, if +she can, God help her! I may suffer, but I am nothing to her now. Let me +go my way.” + +She put her arms on the table, and hid her face in them. “Oh, I cannot +bear it,” she said. + +He rose to his feet slowly. “If it is my presence here that hurts you, +Kate, I will go away. It has been but a painful pleasure to come, and +I have been forced to take it. You will acquit me of coming of my own +choice, Kate. But I will not torment you. I will go away, and never come +again.” + +She lifted her face, and said in a passionate whisper, “Take me with +you.” + +He shook his head. “That's impossible, Kate. You are married now. Your +husband loves you dearly. He is a better man than I am, a thousand, +thousand times.” + +“Do you think I don't know what he is?” she cried, throwing herself +back. “That's why I can't live with him. It's killing me. I tell you I +can't bear it,” she cried, rising to her feet. “Love me! Haven't I tried +to make myself love _him_. Haven't I tried to be a good wife! I can't--I +can't. He never speaks but he torments me. Nothing can happen but it +cuts me through and through. I can't live in this house. The walls are +crushing me, the ceiling is falling on me, the air is stifling me. I +tell you I shall die if you do not take me out of it. Take me, Philip, +take me, take me!” + +She caught him by the arm imploringly, but he only dropped his head down +between both hands, saying in a deep thick voice, “Hush, Kate, hush! I +cannot and I will not. You are mad to think of it.” + +Then she sank down into the chair again, breathless and inert, and +sobbing deep, low sobs. The sound of dancing came from the hall, with +cries of “Hooch!” and the voice of Pete shouting-- + + “Hit the floor with heel and toe + 'Till heaven help the boords below.” + +“Yes, I am mad, or soon will be,” she said in a hard way. “I thought of +that this morning when I crossed the river coming home from church. It +would soon be over _there_, I thought. No more trouble, no more dreams, +no more waking in the night to hear the breathing of the one beside me, +and the voice out of the darkness crying----” + +“Kate, what are you saying?” interrupted Philip. + +“Oh, you needn't think I'm a bad woman because I ask you take me away +from my husband. If I were that, I could brazen it out perhaps, and live +on here, and pretend to forget; many a woman does, they say. And I'm +not afraid that he will ever find me out either. I have only to close my +lips, and he will never know. But _I_ shall know, Philip Christian,” she +said, with a defiant look into his eyes as he raised them. + +Her reproaches hurt him less than her piteous entreaties, and in a +moment she was sobbing again. “Oh, what can God do but let me die! I +thought He would when the child came; but He did not, and then--am I a +wicked woman, after all?--I prayed that He would take my innocent baby, +anyway.” + +But she dashed the tears away in anger at her weakness, and said, “I'm +not a bad woman, Philip Christian; and that's why I won't live here any +longer. There is something you have never guessed, and I have never told +you; but I must tell you now, for I can keep my secret no longer.” + +He raised his head with a noise in his ears that was like the flapping +of wings in the dark. + +“Your secret, Kate?” + +“How happy I was,” she said. “Perhaps I was to blame--I loved you so, +and was so fearful of losing you. Perhaps you thought of all that had +passed between us as something that would go back and back as time went +on and on. But it has been coming the other way ever since. Yes, and as +long as I live and as long as the child lives----” + +Her voice quivered like the string of a bow and stopped. He rose to his +feet. + +“The child, Kate? Did you say the child?” + +She did not answer at once, and then she muttered, with her head down, +“Didn't I tell you there was something you had never guessed?” + +“And is it that?” he said in a fearful whisper. + +“Yes.” + +“You are sure? You are not deceiving yourself? This is not hysteria?” + +“No.” + +“You mean that the child----” + +“Yes.” + +His questions had come in gasps, like short breakers out of a rising +sea; her answers had fallen like the minute-gun above it. Then, in the +silence, Pete's voice came through the wall. He was singing a rough old +ditty-- + + “It was to Covent Gardens I chanced for to go, + To see some of the prettiest flowers which in the gardens grow.” + +Nancy came in with a scuttle of coals. “The lil one's asleep,” she said, +going down on her knees at the fire. She had left the door ajar, and +Pete's song was rolling into the room-- + + “The first was lovely Nancy, so delicate and fair, + The other was a vargin, and she did laurels wear.” + +“Grannie bathed her, and she's like a lil angel in the cot there,” said +Nancy. “And, 'Dear heart alive, Grannie,' says I,' the straight she's +like her father when she's sleeping.'” + +Nancy brushed the hearth and went off. As she closed the door, Pete's +voice ebbed out. + +Philip's lips trembled, his eyes wandered over the floor, he grew very +pale, he tried to speak and could not. All his self-pride was overthrown +in a moment The honour in which he had tried to stand erect as in a +suit of armour was stripped away. Unwittingly he had been laying up +an account with Nature. He had forgotten that a sin has consequences. +Nature did not forget. She had kept her own reckoning. He had struggled +to believe that after all he was a moral man, a free man; but Nature was +a sterner moralist; she had chained him to the past, she had held him to +himself. + +He was still by the fire with his head down. “Did you know this before +you were married to Pete?” he asked, without looking up. + +“Hadn't I wronged him enough without that?” she answered. + +“But did you think of it as something that might perhaps occur?” + +“And if I did, what then?” + +“If you had told me, Kate, nothing and nobody should have come between +us--no,” he said in a decisive voice, “not Pete nor all the world.” + +“And wasn't it your own duty to remember? Was it for me to come to you +and say, 'Philip, something may happen, I am frightened.'” + +Was this the compulsion that had driven her into marriage with the wrong +man? Was it all hysteria? Could she be sure? In any case she could not +think this awful thought and continue to live with her husband. + +“You are right,” he said, with his head still down. “You cannot live +here any longer. This life of deception must end.” + +“Then you will take me away, Philip?” + +“I must, God forgive me, I must. I thought it would be sin. But _that_ +was long ago. It will be punishment. If I had known before--and I have +been coming here time and again--looking on his happiness--but if I had +once dreamt--and then only an hour ago--the oath at its baptism--O God!” + +Her tears were flowing again, but a sort of serenity had fallen on her +now. + +“Forgive me,” she whispered. “I tried to keep it to myself------” + +“You could not keep it; you ought never to have kept it so long; the +finger of God Himself ought to have burnt it out of you.” + +He spoke harshly, and she felt pain; but there was a secret joy as well. + +“I am ruining you, Philip,” she said, leaning over him. + +“We are both drifting to ruin, Katherine,” he answered hoarsely. He was +an abandoned hulk, with anchorage gone and no hand at the helm--broken, +blind, rolling to destruction. + +“I can offer you nothing, Kate, nothing but a hidden life, a life in the +dark. If you come to me you will leave a husband who worships you for +one to whom your life can never be joined. You will exchange a life of +respect by the side of a good man for a life of humiliation, a life of +shame. How can it be otherwise now? It is too late, too late!” + +“Don't think of that, Philip. If you love me there can be no humiliation +and no shame for me in anything. I love you, dear, I cannot help but +love you. Only love me a little, Philip, just a little, dearest, and I +will never care--no, I will never, never care whatever happens.” + +Her passionate devotion swept down all his scruples. His throat +thickened, his eyes grew dim. She put one arm tenderly on his shoulder. + +“I will follow you wherever you must go,” she said. “You are my real +husband, Philip, and always have been. We will love one another, and +that will make up for everything. There is nothing I will not do to make +you forget. If you must go away--far away--no matter where--I will go +with you--and the child as well--and if we must be poor, I'll work with +you.” + +But he did not seem to hear her as he crouched with buried face by the +fire. And, in the silence, Pete's muffled voice came again through the +wall, singing his rugged ditty-- + + “I'm not engaged to any young man, I solemnly do swear, + For I mane to be a vargin and still the laurels wear.” + +Unconsciously their hands touched and their fingers intertwined. + +“It will break his heart,” he muttered. + +She only grasped his hand the closer, and crouched beside him. They were +like two guilty souls at the altar steps, listening to the cheerful bell +that swings in the tower for the happy world outside. + +The door opened with a bang, and Pete rolled in, heaving with laughter. + +“Did you think it was an earth wake, Philip?” he shouted, “or a +blackbird a bit tipsy, eh? Bless me, man, it's good of you, though, +sitting up in the chimney there same as a good ould jackdaw, keeping +the poor wife company when her selfish ould husband is flirting his +tail like a stonechat. The company's going now, Kitty. Will they say +good-night to you? No? Have it as you like, bogh. You're looking tired, +anyway. Dempster, the boys are asking when the ceremony is coming off, +and will you come home to Ramsey that night? But, sakes alive, man, your +eye is splashed with blood as bad as the egg of a robin.” + +In his suffering and degradation, Philip felt as if he wished the earth +to open and swallow him. + +“Bloodshot, is it?” he said. “It's nothing. The ceremony? I'm to take +the oath to-morrow at three o'clock at the Special Council in Douglas. +Yes, I'll come back to Ballure for the night?” + +“Driving, eh?” + +“Yes.” + +“Six o'clock, maybe?” + +“Perhaps seven to eight.” + +“That's all right. Mortal inquisitive the boys are, though. It's in the +breed of these Manx ones, you know. Laxey way, now?” + +“I'll drive by St. John's,” said Philip. + +With a look of wondrous wisdom, and a knowing wink at Kate across +Philip's back, Pete went out. Then there was much talking in low tones +in the hall, and on the paths outside the house. + +Philip understood what it meant. He glanced back at the door, leaned +over to Kate, and said in a whisper, without looking into her eyes-- + +“The carriage shall come at half-past seven. It will stand for a moment +in the Parsonage Lane, and then drive back to Douglas by way of Laxey.” + +His face was broken and ugly with shame and humiliation. As she saw +this she thought of her confession, and it seemed odious to her now; but +there was an immense relief in the feeling that the crisis was over. + +Pete was shouting at the porch, “Good-night, all! Goodnight!” + +“Good-night!” came back in many voices. + +Grannie came in muffled up to the throat. “However am I to get back to +Sulby, and your father gone these two hours?” she said. + +“Not him,” said Pete, coming behind with one eye screwed up and a +finger to his nose. “The ould man's been on the back-stairs all night, +listening and watching wonderful. His bark's tremenjous, but his bite +isn't worth mentioning.” + +And then a plaintive voice came from the hall, saying, “Are you _never_ +coming home, mother? I'm worn out waiting for you.” + +A little patch of youth had blossomed in Grannie since the baby came. + +“Good-night, Pete,” she cried from the gate, “and many happy returns of +the christening-day.” + +“One was enough for yourself, mother,” said Cæsar, and then his voice +went rumbling down the street. + +Philip had come out into the hall. “You're time enough yet,” said Pete. +“A glass first? No? I've sent over to the 'Mitre' for your mare. There +she is; that's her foot on the path. I must be seeing you off, anyway. +Where's that lantern, at all?” + +They stepped out. Pete held the light while Philip mounted, and then he +guided him, under the deep shadow of the old tree, to the road. + +“Fine night for a ride, Phil. Listen! That's the churning of the +nightjar going up to Ballure glen. Well, good-night! Good-night, and God +bless you, old fellow!” + +Kate inside heard the deadened sound of Philip's “Goodnight,” the crunch +of the mare's hoofs on the gravel and the clink of the bit in her teeth. +Then the porch door closed with a hollow vibration like that of a vault, +the chain rattled across it, and Pete was back in the room. + +“_What_ a night we've had of it! And now to bed.” + + + + +XII. + +Kate was up early the next morning, but Pete was stirring before her. As +soon as he had heard the news of Philip's appointment he had organised +a drum and brass band to honour the day of the ceremony. The brass had +been borrowed from Laxey, but the drum had been bought by Pete. + +“Let's have a good sizable drum,” said he; “something with a voice in +it, not a bit of a toot, going off with a pop like bladder-wrack.” + +The parchment was three feet across, the steel rings round it were like +the hoops of a dog-cart, and the black drumsticks, according to Pete, +were like the bullet heads of two niggers. Jonaique Jelly played the +clarionet, and John the Widow played the trombone, but the drum was the +leading instrument. Pete himself played it. He pounded it, boomed it, +thundered it. While he did so, his eyes blazed with rapture. A big +heroic soul spoke out of the drum for Pete. With the strap over his +shoulders, he did not trouble much about the tune. When the heart +Leapt inside his breast, down came the nigger heads on to the mighty +protuberance in front of it; and surely that was the end and aim of all +music. + +The band practised in the cabin which Pete had set up for a summer-house +in the middle of his garden. They met at daybreak that morning for the +last of their rehearsals. And, being up before their morning meal, they +were constrained to smoke and drink as well as play. This they did out +of a single pipe and a single pot, which each took up from the table in +turn as it fell to his part to have a few bars' rest. + +While their muffled melody came to the house through the wooden walls +and the dense smoke, Kate was cooking breakfast. She did everything +carefully, for she was calmer than usual, and felt relieved of the load +that had oppressed her. But once she leaned her head on the mantelshelf +while stooping over the frying-pan, and looked vacantly into the fire; +and once she raised herself up from the table-cloth at the sound of the +drum, and pressed her hand hard on her brow. + +The child awoke in the bedroom above and cried. Nancy Joe went +flip-flapping upstairs, and brought her down with much clucking and +cackling. Kate took the child and fed her from a feeding-bottle which +had been warming on the oven top. She was very tender with the little +one, kissing all its extremities in the way that women have, worrying +its legs, and putting its feet into her mouth. + +Pete came in, hot and perspiring, and Kate handed the child back to +Nancy. + +“Hould hard,” cried Pete; “don't take her off yet. Give me a hould of +her, the lil rogue. My sailor! What a child it is, though! Look at that, +now. She's got a grip of my thumb. What a fist, to be sure! It's lying +in my hand like a meg. Did you stick a piece of dough on the wall +at your last baking, Nancy? Just as well to keep the evil eye off. +Coo--oo--oo! She's going it reg'lar, same as the tide of a summer's day. +By jing, Kitty, I didn't think there was so much fun in babies.” + +Kate, seated at the table, was pouring out the tea, and a sudden impulse +seized her. + +“That's the way,” she said. “First the wife is everything; but the child +comes, and then good-bye to the mother who brought it.” + +“No, by gough!” said Pete. “The child is eighteen carat goold for the +mother's sake, but the mother is di'monds for sake of the child. If I +lost that little one, Kitty, it would be like losing the half of you.” + +“Losing, indeed!” said Nancy. “Who's talking about losing? Does she look +like it, bless her lil heart!” + +“Take her into the kitchen, Nancy,” said Kate. + +“Going to have a rare do to-day,” said Pete, over a mouthful. “I'm off +for Douglas, to see Philip made Dempster. Coming home with himself by +way of St. John's. It's all arranged, woman. Boys to meet the carriage +by Kirk Christ Lezayre at seven o'clock smart. Then out I'm getting, +laying hould of the drum, the band is striking up, and we're bringing +him into Ramsey triumphant. Oh, we'll be doing it grand,” said Pete, +blowing over the rim of his saucer. “John the Clerk is tremenjous on the +trombones, and there's no bating Jonaique with the clar'net--the man is +music to his little backbone. The town will be coming out too, and the +fishermen shouting like one man. We're bound to let the Governor see we +mane it. A friend's a friend, say I, and we're for bucking up for the +man that's bucking up for us. And when he goes to the Tynwald Coort +there, it'll be lockjaw and the measles with some of them. If the +ould Governor's got a tongue like a file, Philip's got a tongue like a +scythe--he'll mow them down. 'No harbour-dues,' says he, 'till we've a +raisonable hope of harbour improvements. Build your embankments for your +trippers in Douglas if you like, but don't ask the fisher-, men to pay +for them.'” + +Pete wiped his mouth and charged his pipe. “It'll be a rare ould dust, +but we're not thinking of ourselves only, though. Aw, no, no. If there +wasn't nothing doing we would be giving him a little tune for all, +coming home Dempster.” + +Pete lit up. “My sailor! It'll be a proud man I'll be this day, Kitty. +Didn't I always say it? 'He'll be the first Manxman living,' says I +times and times, and he's not going to de-ceave me neither.” + +Kate was in fear lest Pete should look up into her face. Catching sight +of a rent in the cloth of his coat, she whipped out her needle and began +to stitch it up, bending closely over it. + +“What an eye a woman's got now,” said Pete. “That was the steel of +the drum ragging me sideways when I was a bit excited. Bless me, Kitty, +there won't be a rag left at me when I get through this everin'. They're +ter'ble on clothes is drums.” + +He was puffing the smoke through her hair as she knelt below him. “Well, +he deserves it all. My sakes, the years I've known him! Him and me have +been same as brothers. Yes, have we, ever since I was a slip of a boy +in jackets, and we went nesting on Maughold Head together. And getting +married hasn't been making no difference. When a man marries he shortens +sail usually, and pitches out some ballast, but not me at all. You're +taking a chill, Kitty. No? Shuddering any way. Chut! This dress is like +paper; you should be having warmer things under it. Don't be going out +to-day, darling, but to-night, about twenty-five minutes better than +seven, just open the door and listen. We'll be agate of it then like +mad, and when you're hearing the drum booming you'll be saying to +yourself, 'Pete's there, and going it for all he knows.'” + +“Oh, Pete, Pete!” cried Kate, and she dropped back at his feet + +“Why, what's this at all?” said Pete. + +“You've been very, very good to me, Pete, and if I never see you again +you'll think the best of me, will you not?” + +She had an impulse to tell all--she could hardly resist it. + +He smoothed the black ripples of her hair back from her forehead, and +said, tenderly, “She's not so well to-day, that's it. Her eyes are +bubbling like the laver.” Then aloud, with a laugh, “Never see me again, +eh? I'm not willing to share you with heaven yet, though. But I'll have +to be doing as the doctor was saying--sending you to England aver. I +will now, I will,” he said, lifting his big finger threateningly. + +She slid backwards to the ground, but at the next moment was landed on +Pete's breast. “My poor lil Kirry! Not willing to stay with me, eh? Tut, +tut! She'll be as smart as ever, soon.” + +She drew away from him with shame and self-reproach, mingled with that +old feeling of personal repulsion which she could not conquer. + +Then the gate of the garden clicked, and Ross Christian came up the +path. “He's sticking to me as tight as a limpet,” said Pete. + +“Mr. Quilliam,” said Ross, “I come from my father this time.” + +“'Deed, man,” said Pete. + +“He is a little pressed for money.” + +“And Mr. Peter Christian sends to me?” + +“He thought you might like to lend on mortgage.” + +“On Ballawhaine?” + +Ross stammered and stuttered, “Well, yes, certainly, as you say, on +Balla----” + +“To think, to think,” muttered Pete. He gazed vacantly before him for +a moment, and then said, sharply, “I've no time to talk of it now, sir. +I'm off to Douglas, but if you like to stop awhile and talk of it with +Mrs. Quilliam, I'll be hearing everything when I come back. Good-day, +Kate. Take care of my wife. Good-day, Nancy; look after my two girls +while I'm away. And Kitty, bogh” (whispering), “mind you send to Robbie +Clucas, the draper, for some nice warm underclothing. Good-bye! Another! +Just one more” (then aloud) “Good-day to you, sir, good-day.” + + + + +XIII. + + “... He, the Spirit Himself, may come + When all the nerve of sense is numb.” + +Philip had not slept at Ballure. The house was in darkness as he passed. +He was riding to Douglas. It is sixteen miles between town and town, six +of them over the steep headland of Kirk Maughold. Before he reached the +top of the ascent he had been an hour on the road, and the night was +near to morning. He had seen no one after leaving Ramsey, except a +drunken miner with his bundle on his stick, marching home to a tipsy +travesty of some brave song. + +His self-righteousness was overthrown; his pride was in the dust. Since +he returned home, he had struggled to feel strong and easy in the sense +of being an honourable man; but now he was thrown violently out of the +path in which he had meant to walk rightly. What he was about to do was +necessary, was inevitable, yet in his relation to Kate he was in the +position of an immoral man, a betrayer, an adulterer, with a vulgar +secret, which he must support by lying and share with servants. And what +was the outlook? What would be the end? Here was a situation from which +there was no escape. Let there be no false glamour, no disguise, no +self-deception. On the eve of his promotion to the dignities and +responsibilities of a Judge, he was taking the first step down on the +course of the criminal! + +The moon was shining at the full. It was low down in the sky, on his +right, and casting his shadow on to the road. He walked his horse up the +long hill. The even pace, the quiet of the night, the drowsy sounds +of unseen stream and far-off murmuring sea overcame him in spite of +himself, and he dozed in the saddle. As he reached the hilltop the +level step of the horse awoke him, and he knew that he was passing that +desolate spot on the border of parish and parish which is known as Tom +Alone's. + +Opening his eyes, without realising that he had slept, he thought he +became aware of another horse and another rider walking by his side. +They were on the left of him, going pace for pace, stepping along with +him like his shadow. “It _is_ my shadow,” he thought, and he forced up +his head to look. Nothing was there but a whitewashed wall that fenced +a sheepfold. The moon had gone under the mountains on the right, and the +night would have been dark but for the stars. With an astonishment near +to terror, Philip gripped the saddle with his quaking knees, and broke +his horse into a trot. + +When the hard ride had brought warmth to his blood and a glow to his +cheeks, he told himself he had been the victim of fancy. It was +nothing; it was a delusion of the sight; a mere shadow cast off by his +distempered brain. He was passing at a walking pace through Laxey by +this time, and as the horse's feet beat up the echoes of the sleeping +town, his heart grew brave. + +Next day, at noon, he was talking with his servant, Jem-y-Lord, in his +rooms in Athol Street. He had lately become tenant of the entire house. +They were in his old chambers on the first floor, looking on to the +churchyard. + +“I may rely on you, Jemmy?” + +“You may, Deemster.” + +His voice was low and husky, his eyes were down, he was fumbling the +papers on the table. “Get the carriage, a landau, from Shimmin's, but +drive it yourself. Be at Government offices at four--we'll go by St. +John's. If there is any attempt at Ramsey to take the horse out of the +carriage, resist it. I will alight at the head of the town. Then drive +on to the lane between the chapel and Elm Cottage. The moment the lady +joins you, start away. Return to Laxey--are the rooms upstairs ready?” + +“They will be.” + +“The two in front of your own, and the little parlour behind this. We +shall need no other servants--the lady will be housekeeper.” + +“I quite understand, Deemster.” + +Philip turned his face aside and spoke thickly, “And you know what +name----” + +“I know what name, Deemster.” + +“You have no objection?” + +“None whatever, Deemster.” + +Phillip drew a long breath. “I am not Deemster yet, Jemmy. Perhaps it +might have been... but God knows. You are a good fellow--I shall not +forget it.” + +He made a motion as if to dismiss the man, but Jemmy did not go. + +“Beg pardon, your honor--” + +“Yes?” + +“Your honour has eaten nothing at breakfast--and the bed wasn't slept in +last night.” + +“I was riding late--then I had work to do.” + +“But I heard your foot on the floor---it woke me times.” + +“I may have speeches to make to-day.... Fetch me a glass of water.” + +Jemmy brought water-bottle and glass. As Philip took the water an +icy numbness seemed to seize his arm. “I--well, I--I declare I can't +lift--ah! thanks.” + +The man raised Philip's arm to his mouth; the glass rattled against his +teeth while he drank. + +“Pardon, your honour. You're looking ten years older lately. The sooner +this day is over the better.” + +“Sleep, Jemmy--I only want sleep. I must have a long, long sleep at +Ballure to-night.” + +He left the house at three minutes to three, carrying his cloak over his +arm. It was a hot day at the beginning of June, and when he stepped out +at the door the air of the street smote his face like a blast from an +open furnace. He reeled and almost fell. The sun's heat was like a load +on his head, its dazzling rays made his sight dim, and he had a sound in +his ears like running water. As he walked down the street he caught his +wandering reflection in the shop windows. “Jemmy was right,” he thought. +“My worst enemy would not accuse me of looking too young to-day.” + +There was a small crowd about the entrance to Government offices. +Carriages were driving up, discharging their occupants and going on. +The Bishop, the Attorney-General, finally the Governor with his wife +and daughter passed into the house. In the commotion of these arrivals +Philip reached the door unobserved. When he was recognised, there was a +sudden hush of voices, and then a low buzz of gossip. He walked through +with a firm step, going in alone, all eyes upon him. + +The doorway opens on a narrow passage, which is neither wide nor very +light, and the sunshine without made the gloom within more grey and +uncertain. As Philip stepped over the threshold he was conscious that +somebody was coming out. When he had taken two paces more, he drew up +sharply with the sense of walking into a mirror. At the next instant he +saw that what he had taken for the reflection of his own face in a glass +was the actual face of another man. + +The man was coming out as he went in. They were approaching each other. +At two paces more they were side by side. He looked at the man with +creeping horror. The man looked at him with amazement and dread. Thus, +eye to eye, they crossed and passed. Then each turned his head over his +shoulder and looked after the other, Philip stepping into the gloom, the +stranger striding into the light. + +At the next moment the narrow doorway was darkened by a ponderous figure +rolling through. Then a heavy hand fell on Philip's shoulder, and a +hearty voice exclaimed, “Hilloa, Christian; proud to see you, boy! +You've outstripped old stick-in-the-mud; but I always knew you would +lead me the way though.... Funking a bit, are you? Hands like ice, +anyway. Come along--nothing to be nervous about--we're not going to give +you the dose of Illiam Dhone---don't martyr the Christians these days, +you know.” + +Is was Philip's old master, the Clerk of the Rolls. Taking Philip's arm, +he was for swinging him along; but Philip, still looking towards +the street, said falteringly, “Did you, perhaps, see a man--a young +man--going out at the door?” + +“When?” + +“As you came in.” + +“Was there?” said the Clerk dubiously; then, as by a sudden light, “Did +he wear a round hat and a monkey-jacket?” + +“Maybe--I hardly know--I didn't observe.” + +“That'll be the man. He's been at me half the morning for admission to +the Council. Said he'd known you all his life. Bough as a thorn-bush, +but somehow I couldn't say no to the fellow at last. He ought to be +inside, though.” + +“It's nothing,” thought Philip. “Only another shadow from a tired +brain. Jemmy's talk about my altered looks--the reflection in the +shop-windows--the sudden gloom after the dazzling sunlight--that's all, +that's all. Sleep, I want sleep.” + +When the Governor took his seat with the first Deemster on his right, +and motioned Philip to the chair on his left, an involuntary murmur +passed over the chamber at the contrast there presented--the one +Deemster very old, with round, russet face, quick, gleaming eyes, and +a comfortable, youthful, even merry expression; the other, very young, +with long, pallid, powerful face, large eyes, and a tired look of age. + +Philip presented his commission received from the Home Secretary, and +the oath of office was administered to him. Kissing a stained copy of a +leather-bound Testament, he repeated the words after the Governor in a +thick croak that seemed to hack the air-- + +“By this book, and by the holy contents thereof, and by the wonderful +works that God hath miraculously wrought in heaven above and on the +earth beneath in six days and seven nights, I, Philip Christian, do +swear that I will, without respect of favour or friendship, love or +hate, loss or gain, consanguinity or affinity, envy or malice, execute +the laws of this Isle justly, betwixt our Sovereign Lady the Queen +and her subjects within this Isle, and betwixt party and party, as +indifferently as the herring backbone doth lie in the midst of the +fish.” + +As Philip pronounced these words, he was conscious of only one face in +that assembly. It was not the face of the Governor, of the Bishop, of +any dignitary of Church or State--but a rugged, eager, dark face over +a black beard in the grip of a great brown hand, with sparkling eyes, +parted lips, and a look of boyish pride--it was the face of Pete. + +“It only remains for me,” said the Governor, “to congratulate your +Honour on the high office to which it has pleased Her Majesty to appoint +you, and to wish you long life and health to fulfil its duties, with +blameless credit to yourself and distinction to your country.” + +There was some other speaking, and then Philip replied. He spoke +clearly, firmly, and well. A reference to his grandfather provoked +applause. His modesty and natural manner made a strong impression. “His +Excellency is not so far wrong, after all,” was the common whisper. + +Some further business, and the Council broke up for general gossip. +Then, on the pavement outside, while the carriages were coming in line, +there were renewed congratulations, invitations, and warnings. The +Governor invited Philip to dinner. He excused himself, saying he had +promised to dine with his aunt at Ballure. The ladies warned him to +spare himself, and recommended a holiday; and then the Clerk of the +Rolls, proud as a peacock, strutting here and there and everywhere, and +assuming the airs of a guardian, cried, “Can't yet, though, for he +holds his first court in Ramsey tomorrow morning.... Put on the cloak, +Christian. It will be cold driving. Good men are scarce.” + +An open landau came up at length, with Jem-y-Lord on the box-seat, and +Pete walking by the horse's head, smoothing its neck and tickling its +ears. + +“Why, you were talking of the young man, Christian, and behold ye, +here's the great fellow himself. Well, young chap,” slapping Pete on the +back, “see your Deemster take the oath, eh?” + +“He's my cousin,” said Philip. + +“Cousin! Is he, then--can he perhaps be--Ah! yes, of course, +certainly------” The good man stammered and stopped, remembering the +marriage of Philip's father. He opened the carriage door and stood aside +for Philip, but Philip said-- + +“Step in, Pete;” and, with a shamefaced look, Pete rolled into the +carriage. Philip took the seat beside him, amid a buzz of voices from +the people standing about the door. + +“Well, as you like; good day, then, boy, good day,” said the Clerk of +the Rolls, clashing the door back. The carriage began to move. + +“Good day, your Honour,” cried several out of the crowd. + +Philip raised his hat. The hats of the men went up to him. Some of the +girls were wiping their eyes. + + + + +XIV. + +While Pete and Philip were driving over the road from Douglas, Kate was +sitting with the child on her lap before the fire in Elm Cottage. Her +eyes were restless, her manner agitated. She looked out at the window +from time to time. The setting sun behind the house still held the day +with horizontal shafts of light in the spring green of the transparent +leaves. + +“Wouldn't you like to see the procession to-night, Nancy?” she said. + +“Aw, mortal,” said Nancy. “But I won't get lave, though. 'Take care of +my two girls,' says he----” + +“You may go, Nancy; I'll see to baby,” said Kate. + +“But the man himself, woman; he'll be coming home as hungry as a +hunter.” + +“I'll see to his supper, too,” said Kate. “Carry the key with you that +you may let yourself in, and be back at half-past seven.” + +Then Nancy began to fly about the kitchen like sputter-ings out of the +frying-pan--filling the kettle, lighting the lamp, and getting together +the baby's night-clothes. Kate watched her and glanced at the clock. + +“Was the town quiet when you were out for the bacon, Nancy?” she said. + +“Quiet enough,” said Nancy. “Everybody flying off Le-zayre way +already--except what were making for the quay.” + +“Is the steamer sailing to-night, then?'' + +“Yes, the _Peveril_; but not water enough to float her till half-past +seven, they were saying. Here's the lil one's nightdress, and here's her +binder, bless her--just big enough for a bandage for a person's wrist if +she sprained it churning.” + +“Lay them on the fender to air, Nancy--I'll not undress baby yet awhile. +And see--it's nearly seven.” + +“I'll be pinning my shawl on and away like the wind,” said Nancy. “The +bogh!” she said, with the pin between her teeth. “She's off again. Do +you really think, now, the angels in heaven are as sweet and innocent, +Kirry? I don't. They can't if they're grown up. And having to climb +Jacob's ladder, poor things, they must be. Then, if they're men--but +that's ridiculous, anyway.” + +“The clock is striking, Nancy. No use going when everything's over,” + said Kate, and the foot with which she rocked the child went faster now +that the little one was asleep. + +“Sakes alive! Let me tie the strings of my bonnet, woman. Pity you +can't come yourself, Kitty. But if they're worth their salt they'll be +whipping round this way and giving you a lil tune, anyway.” + +“Have you got the key, Nancy?” + +“Yes, and I'll be back in an hour. And mind you put baby to bed soon, +and mind you--and mind you----” + +With as many warnings as if she had been mistress and Kate the servant, +Nancy backed herself out of the house. It was now dark outside. + +Kate rose immediately, put the child in the cradle, and began to lay the +table for Pete's supper--the cruet, the plates, the teapot on the hob +to warm, and then--by force of habit--two cups and saucers. But sight of +the cups awakened her to painful consciousness. She put one of them back +in the cupboard, broke the coal on the fire, settled the kettle up to +the blaze, fixed the Dutch oven with three rashers of bacon before the +bars, then lit a candle, and, with a nervous look around, turned to go +upstairs. + +In the bedroom she drew on her cloak, pinned her hat and veil with +trembling fingers, then took her purse from her pocket and emptied its +contents onto the dressing-table. + +“Not mine,” she thought. And standing before the mirror at that moment, +she caught sight of her earrings. “I must take nothing of his,” she told +herself, and she raised her hands to her ears. Then her heart smote her. +“As if Pete would ever think of such things,” she thought. “No, not if +I took everything he has in the world. And must _I_ be thinking of +them?... Yet I cannot--I will not take them with me.” + +She opened a drawer and hurried everything into it--the money, the +earrings, the keeper off her finger, and then she paused at the touch of +the wedding-ring. A superstitious instinct restrained her. Yet the ring +was the badge of her broken covenant. “With this ring I thee wed----” + She tore off the wedding-ring also, and cast it with the rest. + +“He will find them,” she thought. “There will be nothing else to tell +him what has happened. He will come, and I shall be gone. He will call, +and there will be no answer. He will look for me, and I shall be lost to +him for ever. Not a word left behind. Not a line to say, 'Thank you and +good-bye and God bless you, dear Pete, for all your love and goodness to +rae.”' + +It was cruel--very cruel--yet what could she write? What could she +say that had not better be left unsaid? The least syllable--no, +the uncertainty would be kinder. Perhaps Pete would think she was +dead--perhaps that she had destroyed herself. Even that would not be so +bitter as the truth. He would get over it--he would become reconciled. +“No,” she thought, “I can write nothing--I can leave no message.” + +She shut the drawer quickly, and picked up the candle. As she did so, +the shadow of herself moved about her. It mounted from the floor to the +wall, from the wall to the ceiling. When she walked it seemed to be on +top of her, hanging over her, pressing down on her, crushing her. She +grew cold and sick, and hastened to the door. The room was full of other +shadows--the memories of sleepless nights and of painful awakenings. +These stared at her from every familiar thing--the watch ticking in its +stand on the mantelpiece, the handle of the wardrobe, the pink curtains +of the bed, the white pillow beneath them. She felt like a frightened +child. With a terrified glance over her shoulder she crept out of the +room. + +Being downstairs again, she breathed more freely. There was light all +about her, and the hall-parlour was bright and warm. The kettle was now +singing in the cheerful blaze, the cat was purring on the rug, and there +was a smell of bacon slowly frying. She looked at the clock--it was a +quarter after seven. “Time to waken baby,” she thought. + +She took from a chest the child's outdoor clothes--a robe, a pelisse, +and a white hood. Her fingers had touched a scarlet hood in a cardboard +box, but “not that” she thought, and left it. She spread the clothes +about her chair, and then lifted the little one from the cradle to her +pillowing arm. The child awoke as she raised it, and made a fretful cry, +which she smothered in a gurgling kiss. + +“I can love the darling without shame now,” she thought. “It's sweet +face will reproach me no more.” + +With soft cooings at the baby's cheek, she was stooping to take the +robe that lay at her feet, when her eyes fell on the round place in the +cradle where the child had been. That made her think again of Pete. He +would come home and find the little nest cold and empty. It would kill +him; it would be a second bereavement. Was it not enough that she should +go away herself? Must she rob him of the child as well? He loved it; he +doted on it. It was the light of his eyes, the joy of his life. To lose +it would be a blow like the blow of death. + +Yet could a mother leave her child behind her? Impossible! The full +tide of motherhood came over her, and its tender selfishness swept down +everything. “I cannot,” she thought; “come what may, I cannot and I will +not leave her.” And then she reached her hand for the child's pelisse. + +“It would be a kind of atonement, though,” she thought. To leave the +little one to Pete would be making amends in some sort for the wrong +that she was doing him. To deny herself the sight of the child's sweet +face day by day and hour by hour--that would be a punishment also, and +she deserved to be punished. “Can I leave her?” she thought. “Can I? +Oh, what mother could bear it? No, no--never, never! And yet I ought--I +must--Oh, this is terrible!” + +In the midst of this agony of uncertainty, thinking of Pete and of +the wrong she had done him, yet pressing the child to her breast with +trembling arms, as if some one were tearing it away, the babe itself +settled everything. Making some inarticulate whimper of communication, +it nuzzled up to her, its eyes closed, but its head working against her +bosom with the instinct of suckling, though it had never sucked. + +“I'm only half a mother, after all,” she thought. + +The highest joys, the deepest rights of motherhood had been denied to +her--the child taking from the mother, the mother giving to the child, +the child and the mother one--: this had not been hers. + +“My little baby can live without me,” she thought. “If I leave her, she +will never miss me.” + +She nearly broke down at that thought, and almost let her purpose slip. +It was like God's punishment in advance, God's hand directing her--thus +to withdraw the child from dependence on herself. + +“Yes, I must leave her with Pete,” she thought. + +She put the child back into the cradle, half dressed as it was, and +rocked it until it slept again. Then she hung over the tiny bed as a +mother hangs over the little coffin that is soon to be shut up from her +eyes for ever. Her tears rained down on the small counterpane. “My sweet +baby I my little Katherine! I may never kiss you again--never see +you any more'--you may grow up to be a woman and know nothing of your +mother!” + +The clock ticked loud in the quiet room--it was twenty-five minutes past +seven. + +“One kiss more, my little darling. If they ever tell you... they'll say +because your mother left you... Oh, will she think I did not love her? +Hush!” + +Through the walls of the house there came the sound of a band playing +at a distance. She looked at the clock again--it was nearly half-past +seven. Almost at the same moment there was the rumble of carriage-wheels +on the road. They stopped in the lane that ran between the chapel and +the end of the garden. + +Kate rose from her knees and opened the door softly. The house had +been as a dungeon to her, and she was flying from it like a prisoner +escaping. A shrill whistle pierced the air. The _Peveril_ was leaving +the quay. Through the streets there was a sound as of water running over +stones. It was the scuttling of the feet of the townspeople as they ran +to meet the procession. + +She stepped out. The garden was dark and quiet as a prison yard; Hardly +a leaf stirred, but the moon was breaking through the old fir-tree +as she lifted her troubled face to the untroubled sky. She stood and +listened. The band was coming nearer. She could hear the thud of the big +drum. + +Boom! Boom! Boom! + +Pete was there. He was helping at Philip's triumph. That was the beat of +his great heart made audible. + +At this her own heart stopped for a moment. She grew chill at the +thought of the brave man who asked no better lot than to love and +cherish her, and at the memory of the other upon whose mercy she had +cast herself. The band stopped. There was a noise like the breaking of +a mighty rocket in the sky. The people were cheering and clapping hands. +Then a clearer sound struck her ear. It was the clock inside the house +chiming the half-hour. + +Nancy would be back soon. + +Kate listened intently, inclining her head inwards. If the child had +awakened at that instant, if it had stirred and cried, she must have +gone back for good. She returned for one moment and flung herself over +the cradle again. One spasm more of lingering tenderness. “Good-bye, +my little one! I am leaving you with him, darling, because he loves +you dearly. You will grow up and be a good, good girl to him always. +Good-bye, my pet! My precious, my precious! You will reward him for all +he has done for me. You are half of myself, dearest--the innocent half. +Yes, you will wipe out your mother's sin. You will be all he thinks +I am, but never have been. Farewell, my sweet Katherine, my little, +darling baby--good-bye--farewell--good-bye!” + +She leapt up and fled out of the house at last, on tiptoe, like a thief, +pulling the door after her. + +When she heard the click of the lock she felt both wretchedness and +exultation--immense agony and immense relief. If little Katherine were +to cry now, she could not return to her. The door was closed, the house +was shut, the prison was left behind. And behind her, too, were the +treachery, the duplicity, and deceit of ten stifling months. + +She hurried through the garden to a side-door in the wall leading to +the lane. The path was like a wave of the sea to her stumbling feet. +Her breathing was short, her sight was weak, her temples were beating +audibly. Half across the garden something touched her dress, and she +made a faint scream. It was Pete's dog, Dempster. He was looking up at +her out of the darkness of the bushes. By the light through the blind of +the house she could see his bat's ears and watchful eyes. + +Boom! Boom! Boom! + +The band had begun again. It was coming nearer. Philip! Philip! He was +her only refuge now. All else was a blank. + +The side-door had been little used. Its hinges and bolt were rusty and +stiff. She broke her nails in opening it. From the other side came the +light jingle of a curb chain, and over the wall hovered a white sheet of +smoking light. + +The carriage was in the lane, and the driver--Philip's servant, +Jem-y-Lord--stood with the door open. Kate stumbled on the step and fell +into the seat. The door was closed. + +Then a new thought smote her. It was about the child, about Philip, +about Pete. In leaving the little one behind her, though she had meant +it so unselfishly, she had done the one thing that must be big +with consequences. It would bring its penalty, its punishment, its +retribution. Stop! She would go back even yet. Her face was against the +glass; she was struggling with the strap. But the carriage was +moving. She heard the rumble of the wheels; it was like a deafening +reverberation from the day of doom. Then her senses dwaled away and the +carriage drove on. + + + + +XV. + +Outside Ballure House there was a crowd which covered the garden, the +fence, the high-road, and the top of the stone wall opposite. The band +had ceased to play, and the people were shouting, clapping hands, and +cheering. At the door--which was open--Philip stood bareheaded, and a +shaft of the light in the house behind him lit up a hundred of the eager +faces gathered in the darkness. He raised his hand for silence, but +it was long before he was allowed to speak. Salutations rugged, +rough--almost rude--but hearty to the point of homeliness, and +affectionate to the length of familiarity, flew at his head from every +side. “Good luck to you, boy!”--“Bravo for Ramsey!”--“The Christians +for your life!”--“A chip of the ould block--Dempster Christian the +Sixth!”--“Hush, man, he's spaking!”--“Go it, Phil!”--“Give it fits, +boy!”--“Hush! hush!” + +“Fellow-townsmen,” said Philip--his voice swung like a quivering bell +over a sea,--“you can never know how much your welcome has moved me. I +cannot say whether in my heart of hearts I am more proud of it or more +ashamed. To be ashamed of it altogether would dishonour _you_, and to be +too proud of it would dishonour _me_, I am not worthy of your faith and +good-fellowship. Ah!”--he raised his hand to check a murmur of dissent +(the crowd was now hushed from end to end)--“let me utter the thought of +all. In honouring me you are thinking of others also ['No,' 'Yes'); +you are thinking of my people--above all, of one who was laid under the +willows yonder, a wrecked, a broken, a disappointed man--my father, God +rest him! I will not conceal it from you--his memory has been my guide, +his failures have been my lightship, his hopes my beacon, his love my +star. For good or for evil, my anchor has been in the depths of his +grave. God forbid that I should have lived too long under the grasp of +a dead hand. It was my aim to regain what he had lost, and this day has +witnessed its partial reclamation. God grant I may not have paid too +dear for such success.” + +There were cries of “No, sir, no.” + +He smiled faintly and shook his head. “Fellow-countrymen, you believe I +am worthy of the name I bear. There is one among you, an old comrade, a +tried and trusted friend, whose faith would be a spur if it were not a +reproach----” + +His voice was breaking, but still it pealed over the sea of heads. +“Well, I will try to do my duty--from this hour onwards you shall see +me try. Fellow-Manxmen, you will help me for the honour of the place I +fill, for the sake of our little island, and--yes, and for my own sake +also, I know you will--to be a good man and an upright judge. But”--he +faltered, his voice could barely support itself--“but if it should ever +appear that your confidence has been misplaced--if in the time to come +I should seem to be unworthy of this honour, untrue to the oath I took +to-day to do God's justice between man and man, a wrongdoer, not a +righter of the wronged, a whited sepulchre where you looked for a tower +of refuge--remember, I pray of you, my countrymen, remember, much as +you may be suffering then, there will be one who will be suffering +more--that one will be myself.” + +The general impression that night was that the Deemster's speech had +not been a proper one. Breaking up with some damp efforts at the earlier +enthusiasm, the people complained that they were like men who had come +for a jig and were sent home in a wet blanket. There should have been +a joke or two, a hearty word of congratulation, a little natural +glorification of Ramsey, and a quiet slap at Douglas and Peel and +Castletown, a few fireworks, a rip-rap or two, and some general +illumination. “But sakes alive! the solemn the young Dempster was! And +the melancholy! And the mystarious!” + +“Chut!” said Pete. “There's such a dale of comic in you, boys. Wonder in +the world to me you're not kidnapped for pantaloonses. Go home for all +and wipe your eyes, and remember the words he's been spaking. I'm not +going to forget them myself, anyway.” + +Handing over the big drum to little Jonaique, Pete turned to go into the +house. Auntie Nan was in the hall, hopping like a canary about Philip, +in a brown silk dress that rustled like withered ferns, hugging him, +drawing him down to the level of her face, and kissing him on the +forehead. The tears were raining over the autumn sunshine of her +wrinkled cheeks, and her voice was cracking between a laugh and a cry. + +“My boy! My dear boy! My boy's boy! My own boy's own boy!” + +Philip freed himself at length, and went upstairs without turning his +head, and then Auntie Nan saw Pete standing in the doorway. + +“Is it you, Pete?” she said with an effort. “Won't you come in for a +moment? No?” + +“A minute only, then--just to wish you joy, Miss Christian, ma'am,” said +Pete. + +“And you, too, Peter. Ah!” she said, with a bird-like turn of the head, +“you must be a proud man to-night, Pete.” + +“Proud isn't the word for it, ma'am--I'm clane beside myself.” + +“He took a fancy to you when you were only a little barefooted boy, +Pete.” + +“So he did, ma'am.” + +“And now that he's Deemster itself he owns you still.” + +“Aw, lave him alone for that, ma'am.” + +“Did you hear what he said about you in his speech. It isn't everybody +in his place would have done that before all, Pete.” + +“'Deed no, ma'am.” + +“He's true to his friends, whatever they are.” + +“True as steel.” + +The maid was carrying the dishes into the dining-room, and Auntie Nan +said in a strained way, “You won't stay to dinner, Pete, will you? +Perhaps you want to get home to the mistress. Well, home is best for all +of us, isn't it? Martha, I'll tell the Deemster myself that dinner is on +the table. Well, good-night, Peter. I'm always so glad to see you.” + +She was whisking about to go upstairs, but Pete had taken one step into +the dining-room, and was gazing round with looks of awe. + +“Lord alive, Miss Christian, ma'am, what feelings now-barefooted boy, +you say? You're right there, and cold and hungry too, sleeping in +the gable-house with the cow, and not getting much but the milk I was +staling from her, and a leathering at the ould man for that. Philip +fetched me in here one evenin'--that was the start, ma'am. See that +pepper-and-salt egg on the string there? It's a Tommy Noddy's. Philip +got it nesting up Gob-ny-Garvain. Nearly cost him his life, though. You +see, ma'am, Tommy Noddy has only one, and she fights like mad for it. +We were up forty fathom and better, atop of a cave, and had two straight +rocks below us in the sea, same as an elephant's hoofs, you know, +walking out on the blue floor. And Phil was having his lil hand on the +ledge where the egg was keeping, when swoop came the big white wings +atop of his bare head. If I hadn't had a stick that day, ma'am, it would +have been heaven help the pair of us. The next minute Tommy Noddy was +going splash down the cliffs, all feathers and blood together, or Philip +wouldn't have lived to be Dempster.... Aw, frightened you, have I, +ma'am, for all it's so long ago? The heart's a quare thing, now, isn't +it? Got no yesterday nor to-morrow neither. Well, good-night, ma'am.” + Pete was making for the door, when he looked down and said, “What's +this, at all? Down, Dempster, down!” + +The dog had came trotting into the hall as Pete was going out. He was +perking up his big ears and wagging his stump of a tail in front of him. + +“My dog, ma'am? Yes, ma'am, and like its master in some ways. Not much +of itself at all, but it has the blood in it, though, and maybe it'll +come out better in the next generation. Looking for me, are you, +Dempster? Let's be taking the road, then.” + +“Perhaps you're wanted at home, Pete?” + +“Wouldn't trust. Good night, ma'am.” Auntie Nan hopped upstairs in her +rustling dress, relieved and glad in the sweet selfishness of her love +to get rid of Pete and have Philip to herself. + + + + +XVI. + +Pete went off whistling in the darkness, with the dog driving ahead +of him. “I'm to blame, though,” he thought. “Should have gone home +directly.” + +The town was now quiet, the streets were deserted, and Pete began to +run. “She'd be alone, too. That must have been Nancy in the crowd yonder +by Mistress Beatty's. 'Lowed her out to see the do, it's like. Ought to +be back now, though.” + +As Pete came near to Elm Cottage, the moon over the tree-tops lit up +the panes of the upper windows as with a score of bright lamps. One step +more, and the house was dark. + +“She'll be waiting for me. Listening, too, I'll go bail.” + +He was at the gate by this time, and the dog was panting at his feet +with its nose close to the lattice. + +“Be quiet, dog, be quiet.” + +Then he raised the latch without a sound, stepped in on tiptoe, and +closed the gate as silently behind him. + +“I'll have a game with her; I'll take her by surprise.” + +His eyes began to dance with mischief, like a child's, and he crept +along the path with big cat strides, half doubled up, and holding his +breath, lest he should laugh aloud. + +“The sweet creatures! A man shouldn't frighten them, though,” he +thought. + +When he reached the porch he went down on all fours, and began mewing +like a mournful tom-cat near to the bottom of the door. Then he listened +with his ear to the jamb. He expected a faint cry of alarm, the raucous +voice of Nancy Joe, and the clatter of feet towards the porch. There was +not a sound. + +“She's upstairs,” he thought, and stepped back to look up at the front +of the house. There was no light in the rooms above. + +“I know what it is. Nancy is not home yet, and Kirry's fallen asleep at +the rocking.” + +He stole up to the window and tried to look into the hall, but the blind +was down, and he could not see much through the narrow openings at the +sides of it. + +“She's sleeping, that's it. The house was quiet and she dropped off, +rocking the lil one, that's all.” + +He scraped a handful of the light gravel and flung a little of it at the +window. “That'll remind her of something,” he thought, and he laughed +under his breath. + +Then he listened again with his ear at the sill. There was no noise +within. He flung more gravel and waited, thinking he might catch her +breathing, but he could hear nothing. + +Then rising hurriedly and throwing off his playfulness, he strode to +the door and tried to open it. The door was locked. He returned to the +window. + +“Kate!” he called softly. “Kate! Are you there? Do you hear me? It's +Pete. Don't be frightened, Kate, bogh!” + +There was no response. He could hear the beat of the sea on the shore. +The dog had perched himself on one end of the window sill and was +beginning to whine. + +“What's this at all? She can't be out. Couldn't take the child anyway. +Where's that Nancy? What right had the woman to lave her? She has +fainted, being left alone; that's what's going doing.” + +He tried to open the window, but the latch was shot. Then he tried the +other windows, and the back door, and the window above the hall, which +he reached from the roof of the porch; but they would not stir. When he +returned to the hall window, the white blind was darker. The lamp inside +the room was going out. + +The moonlight was dripping down on him through the leaves of the trees. +He found some matches beside his pipe in his side pocket, struck one, +and looked at the sash, then took out his clasp knife to remove the pane +under the latch. His hand trembled and shook and burst through the glass +with a jerk. It cut his wrist, but he felt the wound no more than if +it had been the glass instead of his arm that bled. He thrust his hand +through, shot back the latch, then pushed up the sash, and clambered +into the room past the blind. The cat, sitting on the ledge inside, +rubbed against his hand and purred. + +“Kirry! Kate!” he whispered. + +The lamp had given up its last gleam with the puff of wind from the +window, and, save for the slumbering fire, all was dark within the +house. He hardly dared to drop to his feet for fear of treading on +something. When he was at last in the middle of the floor he stood with +legs apart, struck another match, held the light above his head, and +looked down and around, like a man in a cave. + +There was nothing. The child, awakened by the draught of the night air, +began to cry from the cradle. He took it up and hushed it with baby +words of tenderness in a breaking voice. “Hush, bogh, hush! Mammie will +come to it, then. Mammie will come for all.” + +He lit a candle and crept through the house, carrying the light about +with him. There was no sign anywhere until he came to the bedroom, when +he saw that the hat and cloak of Kate's daily wear had gone. Then he +knew that he was a broken-hearted man. With a cry of desolation he +stopped in his search and came heavily downstairs. + +He had been warding off the moment of despair, but he could do so no +longer now. The empty house and the child, the child and the empty +house; these allowed of only one interpretation. “She's gone, bogh, +she's left us; she wasn't willing to stay with us, God forgive her!” + +Sitting on a stool with the little one on his knees, he sobbed while the +child cried--two children crying together. Suddenly he leapt up. “I'm +not for believing it,” he thought. “What woman alive could do the like +of it? There isn't a mother breathing that hasn't more bowels. And she +used to love the lil one, and me too--and does, and does.” + +He saw how it was. She was ill, distraught, perhaps even--God help her +I--perhaps even mad. Such things happened to women after childbirth--the +doctor himself had said as much. In the toils of her bodily trouble, +beset by mental terrors, she had fled away from her baby, her husband, +and her home, pursued by God knows what phantoms of disease. But she +would get better, she would come back. + +“Hush, bogh, hush, then,” he whimpered tenderly. “Mammie will come home +again. Still and for all she'll come back.” + +There was the click of a key in the lock, and he crept back to the +stool. Nancy came in, panting and perspiring. + +“Dear heart alive! what a race I've had to get home,” she said, puffing +the air of the night. + +She was throwing off her bonnet and shawl, and talking before looking +round. + +“Such pushing and scrooging, you never seen the like, Kirry. Aw, my best +Sunday bonnet, only wore at me once, look at the crunched it is! But +what d'ye think now? Poor Christian Killip's baby is dead for all. Died +in the middle of the rejoicings. Aw, dear, yes, and the band going +by playing 'The Conquering Hero' the very minute. Poor thing! she was +distracted, and no wonder. I ran round to put a sight on the poor soul, +and----why, what's going wrong with the lamp, at all? Is that yourself +on the stool, Kirry? Pete, is it? Then where's the mistress?” + +She plucked up the poker, and dug the fire into a blaze. “What's doing +on you, man? You've skinned your knuckles like potato peel. Man, man, +what for are you crying, at all?” + +Then Pete said in a thick croak, “Hould your bull of a tongue, Nancy, +and take the child out of my arms.” + +She took the baby from him, and he rose to his feet as feeble as an old +man. + +“Lord save us!” she cried. “The window broke, too. What's happened?” + +“Nothing,” growled Pete. + +“Then what's coming of Kirry? I left her at home when I went out at +seven.”. + +“I'm choking with thirst, woman. Can't you be giving a man a drink of +something?” + +He found a dish of milk on the table, where the supper had been laid, +and he gulped it down at a mouthful. + +“She's gone--that's what it is. I see it in your face.” Then going to +the foot of the stairs, she called, “Kirry! Kate! Katherine Cregeen!” + +“Stop that!” shouted Pete, and he drew her back from the stairs. + +“Why aren't you spaking, then?” she cried. “If you're man enough to bear +the truth, I'm woman enough to hear it.” + +“Listen to me, Nancy,” said Pete, with uplifted fist. “I'm going out +for an hour, and till I'm back, stay you here with the child, and say +nothing to nobody.” + +“I knew it!” cried Nancy. “That's what she hurried me out for. Aw, dear! +Aw, dear! What for did you lave her with that man this morning?” + +“Do you hear me, woman?” said Pete; “say nothing to nobody. My +heart's lying heavy enough already. Open your lips, and you'll kill me +straight.” + +Then he went out of the house, staggering, stumbling, bent almost +double. His hat lay on the floor; he had gone bareheaded. + +He turned towards Sulby. “She's there,” he thought “Where else should +she be? The poor, wandering lamb wants home.” + + + + +XVII. + +The bar-room of “The Manx Fairy” was full of gossips 'that night, and +the puffing of many pipes was suspended at a story that Mr. Jelly was +telling. + +“Strange enough, I'm thinking. 'Deed, but it's mortal strange. Talk +about tale-books--there's nothing in the 'Pilgrim's Progress' itself to +equal it. The son of one son coming home Dempster, with processions and +bands of music, at the very minute the son of the other son is getting +kicked out of the house same as a dog.” + +“Strange uncommon,” said John the Widow, and other voices echoed him. + +Jonaique looked round the room, expecting some one to question him. As +nobody did so, except with looks of inquiry, he said, “My ould man +heard it all. He's been tailor at the big house since the time of Iron +Christian himself.” + +“Truth enough,” said Cæsar. + +“And he was sewing a suit for the big man in the kitchen when the bad +work was going doing upstairs.” + +“You don't say!” + +“'You've robbed me!' says the Ballawhaine.” + +“Dear heart alive!” cried Grannie. “To his own son, was it?” + +“'You've cheated me!' says he, 'you deceaved me, you've embezzled my +money and broke my heart!' says he. 'I've spent a fortune on you, and +what have you brought me back?' says he. 'This,' says he, 'and this--and +this--barefaced forgeries, all of them!' says he.” + +“The Lord help us!” muttered Cæsar. + +“'They're calling me a miser, aren't they?' says he. 'I grind my people +to the dust, do I? What for, then? _Whom_ for? I've been a good father +to you, anyway, and a fool, too, if nobody knows it!' says he.” + +“Nobody! Did he say nobody, Mr. Jelly?” said Cæsar, screwing up his +mouth. + +“'If you'd had _my_ father to deal with,' says he, 'he'd have turned +you out long ago for a liar and a thief.' 'My God, father,' says +Ross, struck silly for the minute. 'A thief, d'ye hear me?' says the +Ballawhaine; 'a thief that's taken every penny I have in the world, and +left me a ruined man.'” + +“Did he say that?” said Cæsar. + +“He did, though,” said Jonaique. “The ould man was listening from the +kitchen-stairs, and young Ross snaked out of the house same as a cur.” + +“And where's he gone to?” said Cæsar. + +“Gone to the devil, I'm thinking,” said Jonaique. + +“Well, he'd be good enough for him with a broken back--pity the ould man +didn't break it,” said Cæsar. “But where is the wastrel now?” + +“Gone to England over with to-night's packet, they're saying.” + +“Praise God, from whom all blessings flow,” said Cæsar. + +A grunt came out of the corner from behind a cloud of smoke. “You've +your own rasons for saying so, Cæsar,” said the husky voice of Black +Tom. “People were talking and talking one while there that he'd be +'bezzling somebody's daughter, as well as the ould miser's money.” + +“Answer a fool according to his folly,” muttered Cæsar; and then the +door jerked open, and Pete came staggering into the room. Every pipe +shank was lowered in an instant, and Grannie's needles ceased to click. + +Pete was still bareheaded, his face was ghastly white, and his eyes +wandered, but he tried to bear himself as if nothing had happened. +Smiling horribly, and nodding all round, as a man does sometimes in +battle the moment the bullet strikes him, he turned to Grannie and moved +his lips a little as if he thought he was saying something, though he +uttered no sound. After that he took out his pipe, and rammed it with +his forefinger, then picked a spill from the table, and stooped to the +fire for a light. + +“Anybody--belonging--me--here?” he said, in a voice like a crow's, +coughing as he spoke, the flame dancing over the pipe mouth. + +“No, Pete, no,” said Grannie. “Who were you looking for, at all?” + +“Nobody,” he answered. “Nobody partic'lar. Aw, no,” he said, and he +puffed until his lips quacked, though the pipe gave out no smoke. +“Just come in to get fire to my pipe. Must be going now. So long, boys! +S'long! Bye-bye, Grannie!” + +No one answered him. He nodded round the room again and smiled +fearfully, crossed to the door with a jaunty roll, and thus launched out +of the house with a pretence of unconcern, the dead pipe hanging upside +down in his mouth, and his head aside, as if his hat had been tilted +rakishly on his uncovered hair. + +When he had gone the company looked into each other's faces in surprise +and fear, as if a ghost in broad daylight had passed among them. Then +Black Tom broke the silence. + +“Men,” said he, “that was a d------ lie.” + +“Si------” began Cæsar, but the protest foundered in his dry throat. + +“Something going doing in Ramsey,” Black Tom continued. “I believe in my +heart I'll follow him.” + +“I'll be going along with you, Mr. Quilliam,” said Jonaique. + +“And I,” said John the Clerk. + +“And I”--“And I,” said the others, and in half a minute the room was +empty. + +“Father,” whimpered Grannie, through the glass partition, “hadn't you +better saddle the mare and see if any thing's going wrong with Kirry?” + +“I was thinking the same myself, mother.” + +“Come, then, away with you. The Lord have mercy on all of us!” + + + + +XVIII. + +As soon as he was out of earshot Pete began to run. Within half an +hour he was back at Elm Cottage. “She'll be home by this time,” he told +himself, but he dared not learn the truth too suddenly. Creeping up to +the hall window, he listened at the broken pane. The child was crying, +and Nancy Joe was talking to herself, and sobbing as she bathed the +little one. + +“Bless its precious heart, it's as beautiful as the angels in heaven. +I've bathed her mother on the same knee a hundred times. 'Deed have I, +and a thousand times too. Mother, indeed! What sort of mothers are in +now at all? She must have a heart-as hard as a stone to lave the like +of it. Can't be a drop of nature in her.... Goodness, Nancy, what are +saying for all? Kate is it? Your own little Kirry, and you blackening +her! Aw, dear!--aw, dear! The bogh!--the bogh!” + +Pete could not go in. He crept back to the cabin in the garden and +leaned against it to draw his breath and think. Then he noticed that +the dog was on the path with its long tongue hanging over its jaw. It +stopped its panting to whine woefully, and then it turned towards the +darker part of the garden. + +“He's telling me something,” thought Pete. + +A car rattled down the side road at that moment, and the light of its +lamp shot through the bushes to his feet. + +“The ould gate must be open,” he thought. + +He looked and saw that it was, and then a new light dawned on him. + +“She's gone up to Philip's,” he told himself. “She's gone by Claughbane +to Ballure to find me.” + +Five minutes afterwards he was knocking at Ballure House. His breath was +coming in gusts, perspiration was standing in beads on his face, and his +head was still bare, but he was carrying himself bravely as if nothing +were amiss. His knock was answered by the maid, a tall girl of cheerful +expression, in a black frock, a white apron, and a snow-white cap. Pete +nodded and smiled at her. + +“Anybody been here for me? No?” he asked. + +“No, sir, n--o, I think not,” the girl answered, and as she looked at +Pete her face straightened. + +There was a rustling within as of autumn leaves, and then a twittering +voice cried, “Is it Capt'n Quilliam, Martha?” + +“Yes, ma'am.” + +Some whispered conference took place at the dining-room door, and Auntie +Nan came hopping through the hall. But Pete was already moving away in +the darkness. + +“Shall I call the Deemster, Peter?” + +“Aw, no, ma'am, no, not worth bothering him. Good everin', Miss +Christian, ma'am, good everin' to you.” + +Auntie Nan and Martha were standing in the light at the open door when +the iron gate of the garden swung to with a click, and Pete swung across +the road. + +He was making for the lane which goes down to the shore at the foot of +Ballure Glen. “No denying it,” he thought. “It must be true for all. The +trouble in her head has driven her to it. Poor girl, poor darling!” + +He had been fighting against an awful idea, and the quagmire of despair +had risen to his throat at last. The moon was behind the cliffs, and he +groped his way through the shadows at the foot of the rocks like one who +looks for something which he dreads to find. He found nothing, and his +catchy breathing lengthened to sighs. + +“Thank God, not here, anyway!” he muttered. + +Then he walked down the shore towards the harbour. The tide was still +high, the wash of the waves touched his feet; on the one hand the dark +sea, unbroken by a light, on the other the dull town blinking out and +dropping asleep. + +He reached the end of the stone pier at the mouth of the harbour, and +with his back to the seaward side of the lighthouse he stared down into +the grey water that surged and moaned under the rounded wall. A black +cloud like a skate was floating across the moon, and a startled gannet +scuttled from under the pier steps into the moon's misty waterway. There +was nothing else to be seen. + +He turned back towards the town, following the line of the quay, and +glancing down into the harbour when he came to the steps. Still he saw +nothing of the thing he looked for. “But it was high water then, and now +it's the ebby tide,” he told himself. + +He had met with nobody on the shore or on the pier, but as he passed +the sheds in front of the berth for the steamers he was joined by the +harbour-master, who was swinging home for the night, with his coat +across his arm. Then he tried to ask the question that was slipping off +his tongue, but dared not, and only stammered awkwardly---- + +“Any news to-night, Mr. Quay le?” + +“Is it yourself, Capt'n? If you've none, I've none. It's independent +young rovers like you for newses, not poor ould chaps tied to the +harbour-post same as a ship's cable. I was hearing you, though. You'd +a power of music in the everin' yonder. Fine doings up at Ballure, +seemingly.” + +“Nothing fresh with yourself then, Daniel? No?” + +“Except that I am middling sick of these late sailings, and the sooner +they're building us a breakwater the better. If the young Deemster will +get that for us, he'll do.” + +They were nearing a lamp at the corner of the marketplace. + +“It's like you know the young Ballawhaine crossed with the boat +to-night? Something wrong, with the ould man, they're telling me. But +boy, veen, what's come of your hat at all?” + +“My hat?” said Pete, groping about his head. “Oh, my hat? Blown off on +the pier, of coorse.” + +“'Deed, man! Not much wind either. You'll be for home and the young +wife, eh, Capt'n?” + +“Must be,” said Pete, with an empty laugh. And the harbour-master, who +was a bachelor, laughed more heartily, and added---- + +“You married men are like Adam, you've lost the rib of your liberty, but +you've got a warm little woman to your side instead.” + +“Ha! ha! ha! Goodnight!” + +Pete's laugh echoed through the empty market-place. + +The harbour-master had seen nothing. Pete drew a long breath, followed +the line of the harbour as far as to the bridge at the end of it, and +then turned back through the town. He had forgotten again that he was +bareheaded, and he walked down Parliament Street with a tremendous step +and the air of a man to whom nothing unusual had occurred. People were +standing in groups at the corner of every side street, talking eagerly, +with the low hissing sound that women make when they are discussing +secrets. So absorbed were they that Pete passed some of them unobserved. +He caught snatches of their conversation. + +“The rascal,” said one. + +“Clane ruined the ould man, anyway,” said another. + +“Ross Christian again,” thought Pete. But a greater secret swamped +everything. Still he heard the people as he passed. + +“Sarve her right, though, whatever she gets--she knew what he was.” + +“Laving the child, too, the unfeeling creature.” + +Then the sharp voices of the women fell on the dull consciousness of +Pete like forks of lightning. + +“Whisht, woman! the husband himself,” said somebody. + +There was a noise of feet like the plash of retiring waves, and Pete +noticed that one of the groups had broken into a half circle, facing +him as he strode along the street. He nodded cheerfully over both sides, +threw back his bare head, and plodded on. But his teeth were set hard, +and his breathing was quick and audible. + +“I see what they mane,” he muttered. + +Outside his own house he found a crowd. A saddle-horse, with a cloud of +steam rising from her, was standing with the reins over its head, linked +to the gate-post. It was Cæsar's mare, Molly. Every eye was on the +house, and no one saw Pete as he came up behind. + +“Black Tom's saying there's not a doubt of it,” said a woman. + +“Gone with the young Ballawhaine, eh?” said a man. + +“Shame on her, the hussy,” said another woman. + +Pete ploughed his way through with both arms, smiling and nodding +furiously. “If you, plaze, ma'am I If _you_ plaze.” + +As he pushed on he heard voices behind him. “Poor man, he doesn't know +yet.”--“I'm taking pity to look at him.” + +The house-door was open. On the threshold stood a young man with long +hair and a long note-book. He was putting questions. “Last seen at seven +o'clock--left alone with child--husband out with procession--any other +information?” + +Nancy Joe, with the child on her lap, was answering querulously from +the stool before the fire, and Cæsar, face down, was leaning on the +mantelpiece. + +Pete took in the situation at a glance. Then he laid his big hand on +the young man's shoulder and swung him aside as if he had been turning a +swivel. + +“What going doing?” he asked. + +The young man faltered something. Sorry to intrude--Capt'n Quilliam's +trouble. + +“What trouble?” said Pete. + +“Need I say--the lamented--I mean distressing--in fact, the mysterious +disappearance----” + +“What disappearance?” said Pete, with an air of amazement. + +“Can it be, sir, that you've not yet heard----” + +“Heard what? Your tongue's like a turnip-watch in a fob pocket--out with +it, man.” + +“Your wife, Captain----” + +“What? My wife disa---- What? So this is the jeel! My wife mysteriously +disappear---- Oh, my gough!” + +Pete burst into a peal of laughter. He shouted, roared, held his sides, +doubled, rocked up and down, and at length flung himself into a chair, +threw back his head, heaved out his legs, and shook till the house +itself seemed to quake. + +“Well, that's good! that's rich! that bates all!” he cried. + +The child awoke on Nancy's knee and sent its thin pipe through Pete's +terrific bass. Cæsar opened his mouth and gaped, and the young man, now +white and afraid, scraped and backed himself to the door, saying-- + +“Then perhaps it's not true, after all, Capt'n?” + +“Of coorse it's not true,” said Pete. + +“Maybe you know where she's gone.” + +“Of course I know where's she's gone. I sent her there myself!” + +“You did, though?” said Cæsar. + +“Yes, did I--to England by the night sailing.” + +“'Deed, man!” said Cæsar. + +“The doctor ordered it. You heard him yourself, grandfather.” + +“Well, that's true, too,” said Cæsar. + +The young man closed his long note-book and backed into a throng of +women who had come up to the porch. “Of course, if you say so, Capt'n +Quilliam----” + +“I do say so,” shouted Pete; and the reporter disappeared. + +The voices of two women came from the gulf of white faces wherein the +reporter had been swallowed up. “I'm right glad it's lies they've been +telling of her, Capt'n,” said the first. + +“Of coorse you are, Mistress Kinnish,” shouted Pete. + +“I could never have believed the like of the same woman, and I always +knew the child was brought up by hand,” said the other. + +“Coorse you couldn't, Mistress Kewley,” Pete replied. + +But he swung up and kicked the door to in their faces. The strangers +being shut out, Cæsar said cautiously-- + +“Do you mane that, Peter?” + +“Molly's smoking at the gate like a brewer's vat, father,” said Pete. + +“The half hasn't been told you, Peter. Listen to me. It's only proper +you should hear it. When you were away at Kim-berley this Ross Christian +was bothering the girl terrible.” + +“She'll be getting cold so long out of the stable,” said Pete. + +“I rebuked him myself, sir, and he smote me on the brow. Look! Here's +the mark of his hand over my temple, and I'll be carrying it to my +grave.” + +“Ross Christian! Ross Christian!” muttered Pete impatiently. + +“By the Lord's restraining grace, sir, I refrained myself--but if Mr. +Philip hadn't been there that night--I'm not hould-ing with violence, +no, resist not evil--but Mr. Philip fought the loose liver with his fist +for me; he chastised him, sir; he--” + +“D------the man!” cried Pete, leaping to his feet. “What's he to me or +my wife either?” + +Cæsar went home huffed, angry, and unsatisfied. And then, all being gone +and the long strain over, Pete snatched the puling child out of Nancy's +arms, and kissed it and wept over it. + +“Give her to me, the bogh,” he cried, hoarse as a raven, and then sat +on the stool before the fire, and rocked the little one and himself +together. “If I hadn't something innocent to lay hould of I should be +going mad, that I should. Oh, Katherine bogh! Katherine bogh! My little +bogh! My I'll bogh millish!” + +In the deep hours of the night, after Nancy had grumbled and sobbed +herself to sleep by the side of the child, Pete got up from the sofa in +the parlour and stole out of the house again. + +“She may come up with the morning tide,” he told himself. “If she does, +what matter about a lie, God forgive me? God help me, what matter about +anything?” + +If she did not, he would stick to his story, so that when she came back, +wherever she had been, she would come home as an honest woman. + +“And _will be_, too,” he thought. “Yes, will be, too, spite of all their +dirty tongues--as sure as the Lord's in heaven.” + +The dog trotted on in front of him as he turned up towards Ballure. + + + + +XIX. + +Philip had not eaten much that night at dinner. He had pecked at the +wing of a fowl, been restless, absent, preoccupied, and like a man +struggling for composure. At intervals he had listened as for a step or +a voice, then recovered himself and laughed a little. + +Auntie Nan had explained his uneasiness on grounds of natural excitement +after the doings of the great day. She had loaded his plate with good +things, and chirruped away under the light of the lamp. + +“So sweet of you, Philip, not to forget Pete amid all your success. He's +really such a good soul. It would break his heart if you neglected him. +Simple as a child, certainly, and of course quite uneducated, but----” + +“Pete is fit to be the friend of any one, Auntie.” + +“The friend, yes, but you'll allow not exactly the companion----” + +“If he is simple, it is the simplicity of a nature too large for little +things.” + +“The dear fellow! He's not a bit jealous of you, Philip.” + +“Such feelings are far below him, Auntie.” + +“He's your first cousin after all, Philip. There's no denying that. As +he says, the blood of the Christians is in him.” + +The conversation took a turn. Auntie Nan fell to talking of the other +Peter, uncle Peter Christian of Ballawhaine. This was the day of the big +man's humiliation. The son he had doted on was disgraced. She tried, but +could not help it; she struggled, but could not resist the impulse--in +her secret heart the tender little soul rejoiced. + +“Such a pity,” she sighed. “So touching when a father--no matter how +selfish--is wrecked by love of a thankless son. I'm sorry, indeed I am. +But I warned him six years ago. Didn't I, now?” + +Philip was far away. He was seeing visions of Pete going home, +the deserted house, the empty cradle, the desolate man alone and +heart-broken. + +They rose from the table and went into the little parlour, Auntie Nan on +Philip's arm, proud and happy. She fluttered down to the piano and sang, +to cheer him up a little, an old song in a quavering old voice. + + “Of the wandering falcon + The cuckoo complains, + He has torn her warm nest, + He has scattered her young.” + +Suddenly Philip got up stiffly, and said in a husky whisper, “Isn't that +his voice?” + +“Who's, dear?” + +“Pete's.” + +“Where, dearest?” + +“In the hall.” + +“I hear nobody. Let me look. No, Pete's not here. But how pale you are, +Philip. What's amiss?” + +“Nothing,” said Philip. “I only thought----” + +“Take some wine, dear, or some brandy. You've overtired yourself to-day, +and no wonder. You must have a long, long rest to-night.” + +“Yes I'll go to bed at once.” + +“So soon! Well, perhaps it's best. You want sleep: your eyes show that. +Martha! Is everything ready in the Deemster's room? All but the lamp? +Take it up, Martha. Philip, you'll drink a little brandy and water +first? I'll carry it to your room then; you might need it in the night. +Go before me, dear. Yes, yes, you must. Do you think I want you to +see how old I am when I'm going upstairs? Ah! I hadn't to climb by the +banisters this way when I came first to Bal-lure.” + +On reaching the landing, Philip was turning to his old room, the bedroom +he had occupied from his boyhood up, the bedroom of his mother's father, +old Capt'n Billy. + +“Not that way to-night, Philip. This way--_there!_ What do you say to +_that?_” + +She pushed open the door of the room opposite, and the glow of the fire +within rushed out on them. + +“My father's room,” said Philip, and he stepped back. + +“Oh, I've aired it, and it's not a bit the worse for being so long shut +up. See, it's like toast Oo--oo--oo! Not the least sign of my breath. +Come!” + +“No, Auntie, no.” + +“Are you afraid of ghosts? There's only one ghost lives here, Philip, +the memory of your dear father, and that will never harm you.” + +“But this place is too sacred. No one has slept here since----” + +“That's why, dearest. But now you have justified your father's hopes, +and it must be your room for the future. Ah! if he could only see +you himself, how proud he would be! Poor father! Perhaps he does. Who +knows--perhaps--kiss me, Philip. See what an old silly I am, after all. +So happy that I have to cry. But mind now, you've got to sleep in this +room every time you come to hold court in Ramsey. I refuse to share you +with Elm Cottage any longer. Talk about jealousy! If Pete isn't +jealous, I know somebody who is--or soon will be. But Philip--Philip +Christian----” + +“Yes?” + +The sweet old face grew solemn. “The greatest man has his cares and +doubts and divisions. That's only natural--out in the open field of +life. But don't be ashamed to come here whenever you are in trouble. +It's what home is for, Philip. Just a place of peace and shelter from +the rough world, when it wounds and hurts you. A quiet spot, dear, with +memories of father and mother and innocent childhood--and with an old +goose of an auntie, maybe, who thinks of you all day and every day, +and is so vain and foolish--and--and who loves you. Philip, better than +anybody in the World.” + +Philip's arms were about the old soul, but he had not heard her. With a +terrified glance towards the window, he was saying in a low quick voice, +“Isn't that a footstep on the gravel?” + +“N--o, no! You're nervous to-night, Philip. Lie and rest. When you're +asleep, I'll creep back and look at you.” + +She left him, and he looked around. Not in all the world could Philip +have found a spot so full of terrors. It was like a sepulchre of dead +things--his dead father, his dead mother, his dead youth, his dead +innocence, his slaughtered friendship, and his outraged conscience. + +Over the fireplace hung a portrait of his mother. It was the picture +of a comely girl, young and soft, with full ripe lips and bright brown +eyes. Philip shuddered as he looked at it. The portrait was like the +ghost of himself looking through the veil of a woman's face. + +Facing this, and hanging over the side of the bed, was a portrait of his +father. The eyes were full of light, the lines of the cheek were round; +the mouth seemed to quiver with a tender smile. But Philip could not see +it as it was. He saw it with straggling hair, damp and long as reeds, +the cheeks pallid and drawn, the eyes like lamps in a mist, the throat +bare of the shirt, and the lips kept apart by laboured breathing. + +Near the window stood the cot where he had once slept with Pete, and +leaped up in the morning and laughed. On every hand, wherever his eye +could rest, there rose a phantom of his lost and buried life. And Auntie +Nannie's love and pride had brought him to this chamber of torture! + +The night was calm enough outside; but it seemed to lie dead within that +room, so quiet was it and so still. There was a clock, but it did not +go; and there was a cage for a bird, but no bird pecked in it, Philip +thought he heard a knocking at the door of the house. Nobody answered +it, so he rang for the maid. She came upstairs with a smile. + +“Didn't you hear a knock at the front door, Martha?” + +“No, sir,” said the girl. + +“Strange! Very strange! I could have sworn it was the knock of Mr. +Quilliam.” + +“Perhaps it was, sir. Ill go and look.” + +“No matter. I've a singing in my ears to-night. It must be that.” + +The girl left him. He threw off his boots and began to creep about the +room as if he were doing something in which he feared detection. Every +time his eyes fell on the portrait of his father he dropped his head and +turned aside. Presently he heard voices in the room below. This time the +sound in his ears was no dreaming. He opened the door noiselessly and +listened. It was Pete. Martha was answering him. Auntie Nan was calling +from the dining-room, and Pete was saying “No, no,” in a light way and +moving off. The gate of the garden clicked and the front door was closed +quietly. Then Philip shut the door of his own room without a sound. + +A moment later Auntie Nan re-opened it. She was carrying a lighted +candle. + +“Such an extraordinary thing, Philip. Martha says you thought you heard +Peter knocking, and, do you know, he must have been coming up the hill +at that very moment. He was so strange, too, and looked so wild. Asked +if anybody had been here inquiring for him; as if anybody should. +Wouldn't have me call to you, and went off laughing about nothing. +Really, if I hadn't known him for a sober man----” + +Philip felt sick-and chill, and-he began to shiver. An irresistible +impulse took hold of him. It was like the half-smothered fear which +makes guilty men go to sit at the inquests on their murdered victims. + +“Something wrong,” he said. “Where are my boots?” + +“Going to Elm Cottage, Philip? Pity the coachman drove back to Douglas. +Hadn't you better send Martha? Besides, it may be only my fancy. Why +worry in any case? You're too tender-hearted--indeed you are.” + +Philip fled downstairs like one who flies from torture. While dragging +on his coat in the hall, he began to foresee what was before him. He was +to go to Pete, pretending to know nothing; he was to hear Pete's story, +and show surprise; he was to comfort Pete--perhaps to help him in his +search, for he dared not appear _not_ to help--he was to walk by Pete's +side, looking for what he knew they should not find. He saw himself +crawling along the streets like a snake, and the part he had to play +revolted him. He went upstairs again. + +“On second thoughts, you must be right, auntie.” + +“I'm sure I am.” + +“If not, he'll come again.” + +“I'm sure he will.” + +“If there's anything amiss with Pete, he'll come first to me.” + +“There can be nothing amiss except what I say. Just a glass too much +maybe and no great sin either, considering the day, and how proud he is, +for your sake, Philip. I believe in my heart that young man couldn't be +prouder and happier if he stood in your own shoes instead.” + +“Good-night, Auntie,” said Philip, in a thick gurgle. + +“Good-night, dear. I'm going to bed, and mind you go yourself.” + +Being alone, Philip found himself leaning against the mantelpiece and +looking across at his father's picture. He began to contrast his father +with himself. He was a success, his father had been a failure. At +seven-and-twenty he was Deemster at all events; at thirty his father had +died a broken man. He had got what he had worked for; he had recovered +the place of his people; and yet how mean a man he was compared to him +who had done nothing and lost all. + +Failure was all that his father had had to reproach himself with; but +he had to accuse himself of dishonour as well. His father's offence had +been a fault; his own was a crime. If his father had been willing to +betray love and friendship, he might have succeeded. Because he himself +had been true to neither, he had not failed. The very excess of his +father's virtues had kept him down. Every act of his own selfishness +had pushed him up. His father had thought first of love and truth and +an upright life, and last of money and rank and applause. The world had +renounced his father because his father had first renounced the world. +But it had opened its arms to him, and followed him with shouts and +cheers, and loaded him with honours. And yet, miserable man, better be +down in the ooze and slime of a broken life, better be dead and in the +grave--for the dead in his grave must despise him. + +An awful picture rose before Philip. It was a picture of himself in the +time to come. An old man--great, powerful, perhaps even beloved, maybe +worshipped, but heart-dead, tottering on to the grave, and the mockery +of a gorgeous funeral, with crowds and drums and solemn music. Then +suddenly a great silence, as if the snow had begun to fall, and a great +white light, and an awful voice crying, “Who is this that comes with +dust for a bleeding heart, and ashes for a living soul?” + +Philip screamed aloud at the vision, as piece by piece he put it +together. His cry died off with a tingle in the china ornaments of the +mantelpiece, and he remembered where he was. Then two gentle taps came +to the door of his room. He composed himself a little, snatched up a +book, and cried “Come in!” + +It was Auntie Nan. She was in her night-dress and night-cap. A candle +was in her hand, and the flame was shaking. + +“Whatever's to do, my child?” she said. + +“Only reading aloud, Auntie. Did I awaken you?” + +“But you screamed, Philip.” + +“Macbeth, Auntie. See, the banquet scene. He has become king, you know, +but his conscience----” + +He stopped. The little lady looked at him dubiously and made a pull +at the string of her night-cap, causing it to fall aside and give a +grotesque appearance to her troubled old face. + +“Take a little brandy, dear. I left it here on the dressing-table.” + +“Don't trouble about me, Auntie. Good-night again. There! go back to +bed.” + +Half coaxing, half forcing her, he drew her to the door, and she went +out slowly, reluctantly, doubtfully, the wandering strings of her cap +trailing on her shoulders, and her bare feet nipping up the bottom of +the night-dress behind her. + +Philip looked at the book he had snatched up in his haste. What had put +that book of all books into his hand? What had brought him to that room +of all rooms? And on that night of all nights? What devil out of hell +had tempted Auntie Nan to torture him? He would not stay; he would go +back to his own bed. + +Out on the landing he heard a low voice. It came from Auntie Nan's room. +A spear of candle-light shot from her door, which was ajar. He paused +and looked in. The white night-dress was by the bedside, the night-cap +was buried in the counterpane. A cat had established itself beside it, +and was purring softly. Auntie Nan was on her knees. Philip heard his +own name---- + +“God bless my Philip in the great place to which he has been called this +day. Give him wisdom and strength and peace!” + +Holy woman, with angels hovering over you, who dared to think of devils +tempting your innocence and love? + +Philip went back to his father's room. He began to reconcile himself +to his position. Though he had been extolling his father at his own +expense, what had he done but realise his father's hopes. And, after +all, he could not have acted differently. At no point could he have +behaved otherwise than he had. What had he to accuse himself for? If +there had been sin, he had been dragged into it by blind powers which he +could not command. And what was true of himself was also true of Kate. + +Ah! he could see her now. She was gone where he had sent her. There +were tears in her beautiful eyes, but time would wipe them away. The +duplicity of her old life was over; the corroding deceit, the daily +torment, the hourly infidelity--all were left behind. If there was +remorse, it was the fault of destiny; and if she was suffering the pangs +of shame, she was a woman, and she would bear it cheerfully for the sake +of the man she loved. She was going through everything for him. Heaven +bless her! In spite of man and man's law, she was his love, his darling, +his wife--yes, his wife--by right of nature and of God; and, come what +would, he should cling to her to the last. + +Suddenly a thick voice cut through the still air of the night. + +“Philip!” + +It was Pete at last He was calling up at the window from the path below. +Philip groaned and covered his face with his hands. + +“Philip!” + +With rigid steps Philip walked to the window and threw up the sash. It +was starlight, and the branches were bending in the night air. + +“Is it you, Pete?” + +“Yes, it's me. I was seeing the lamp, so I knew you war'n in bed at all. +Studdying a bit, it's like, eh? I thought I wouldn't waken the house, +but just shout up and tell you.” + +“What is it, Pete?” said Philip. His voice shivered like a sail at +tacking. + +“Nothing much at all. Only the wife's gone to England over by the +night's steamer.” + +“To England?” + +“Aw, time for it too, I'm thinking; the wake and narvous she's been +lately. You remember what the doctor was saying yonder everin,' when we +christened the child? 'Send her out of the island,' says he, 'and she'll +be coming home another woman.' Wasn't for going, though. Crying and +shouting she wouldn't be laving the lil one. So I had to put out a bit +of authority. Of course, a husband's got the right to do that, Philip, +eh? Well, I'll be taking the road again. Doing a fine night, isn't it? +Make's a man unwilling to go to bed.” + +Philip trembled and felt sick. He tried to speak, but could utter +nothing except an inarticulate noise. As Pete went off, an owl screeched +in the glen. Philip drew down the sash, pulled the blind, tugged the +curtains across, stumbled into the middle of the floor, and leaned +against the bed. + +“Such is the beginning of the end,” he thought. + +The duplicity, the deceit, the daily torment which Kate had left behind, +were henceforward to be his own! At one flash, as of lightning, he saw +the path before him. It was over cliffs and chasms and quagmires, where +his foot might slip at any step. + +His head began to reel. He took the brandy bottle from the +dressing-table, poured out half a tumbler, and drained it at one +draught. As he did so, his eyes above the rim of the glass rested on the +portrait of his mother over the fireplace. The face as he saw it then +was no longer the face of the winsome bride. It was the living face as +he remembered it--bleared, bloated, gross, and drunken. She smiled on +him, she beckoned to him. + +It was the beginning of the end indeed. He was his mother's son as well +as his father's. The father had ruled down to that day, but it was the +turn of the mother now. He could not resist her. She was alive in his +blood, and he was hers. + +Never before had he touched raw spirits, and the brandy mastered him +instantly. Feeling dizzy, he made an effort to undress and get into bed. +He dragged off his coat and his waistcoat, and threw his braces over his +shoulders. Then he stumbled, and he had to lay hold of the bedpost. His +hand grew chill and relaxed its hold. Stupor came over him. He slipped, +he slid, he fell, and rolled with outstretched arms on to the floor. The +fire went out and the lamp died down. + +Then the sun came up over the sea. It was a beautiful morning. The town +awoke; people hailed each other cheerfully in the streets, and joy-bells +rang from the big church tower for the first court-day of the new +Deemster. But the Deemster himself still lay on the floor, with damp +forehead and matted hair, behind the blind of the darkened room. + + + + +PART V. MAN AND MAN. + + + + +I. + +It was Saturday, and the market-place was covered with the carts and +stalls of the country people. After some feint of eating breakfast, Pete +lit his pipe, called for a basket, and announced his intention of doing +the marketing. + +“Coming for the mistress, are you, Capt'n?” + +“I'm a sort of a grass-widow, ma'am. What's your eggs to-day, Mistress +Cowley?” + +“Sixteen this morning, sir, and right ones too. They were telling me +you've been losing her.” + +“Give me a shilling's worth, then. Any news over your side, Mag?” + +“Two--four--eight--sixteen--it's every appearance we'll be getting a +early harvest, Capt'n.” + +“Is it yourself, Liza? And how's your butter to-day?” + +“Bad to bate to-day, sir, and only thirteen pence ha'penny. Is the lil +one longing for the mistress, Capt'n?” + +“I'll take a couple of pounds, then. What for longing at all when it's +going bringing up by hand it is? Put it in a cabbage leaf, Liza.” + +Thus, with his basket on his arm and his pipe in his mouth, Pete passed +from stall to stall, chatting, laughing, bargaining, buying, shouting +his salutations over the general hum and hubbub, as he ploughed his way +through the crowd, but listening intently watching eagerly, casting out +grapples to catch the anchor he had lost, and feeling all the time that +if any eye showed sign of knowledge, if any one began with “Capt'n, I +can tell you where she is,” he must leap on the man like a tiger, and +strangle the revelation in his throat. + +Next day, Sunday, his friends from Sulby came to quiz and to question. +He was lounging in his shirt-sleeves on a deck-chair in his ship's +cabin, smoking a long pipe, and pretending to be at ease and at peace +with all the world. + +“Fine morning, Capt'n,” said John the Clerk. + +“It _is_ doing a fine morning, John,” said Pete. + +“Fine on the sea, too,” said Jonaique. + +“Wonderful fine on the sea, Mr. Jelly.” + +“A nice fair wind, though, if anybody was going by the packet to +Liverpool. Was it as good, think you, for the mistress on Friday night, +Mr. Quilliam?” + +“I'll gallantee,” said Pete. + +“Plucky, though--I wouldn't have thought it of the same woman--I +wouldn't raelly,” said Jonaique. + +“Alone, too, and landing on the other side so early in the morning,” + said John the Clerk. + +“Smart, uncommon! It isn't every woman would have done it,” said Kelly +the Postman. + +“Aw, we've mighty boys of women deese days--we have dough,” snuffled the +constable, and then they all laughed together. + +Pete watched their wheedling, fawning, and whisking of the tail, and +then he said, “Chut! What's there so wonderful about a woman going by +herself to Liverpool when she's got somebody waiting at the stage to +meet her?” + +The laughing faces lengthened suddenly. “And had she, then,” said John +the Clerk. + +Pete puffed furiously, rolled in his seat, laughed like a man with a +mouth full of water, and said, “Why, sartenly--my uncle, of coorse.” + +Jonaique wrinkled his forehead. “Uncle,” he said, with a click in his +throat. + +“Yes, my Uncle Joe,” said Pete. + +Jonaique looked helplessly across at John the Clerk. John the Clerk +puckered up his mouth as if about to whistle, and then said, in a +faltering way, “Well, I can't really say I've ever heard tell of your +Uncle Joe before, Capt'n.” + +“No?” said Pete, with a look of astonishment. “Not my Uncle Joseph? The +one that left the island forty years ago and started in the coach and +cab line? Well, that's curious. Where's he living? Bless me, where's +this it is, now? Chut! it's clane forgot at me. But I saw him myself +coming home from Kimberley, and since then he's been writing constant. +'Send her across,' says he; 'she'll be her own woman again like +winking.' And you never heard tell of him? Not Uncle Joey with the bald +head? Well, well! A smart ould man, though. Man alive, the lively he is, +too, and the laughable, and the good company. To look at that man's face +you'd say the sun was shining reg'lar. Aw, it's fine times she'll be +having with Uncle Joe. No woman could be ill with yonder ould man about. +He'd break your face with laughing if it was bursting itself with a +squinsey. And you never heard tell of my Uncle Joe, of Scotland Road, +down Clarence Dock way? To think of that now!” + +They went off with looks of perplexity, and Pete turned into the house. +“They're trying to catch me; they're wanting to shame my poor lil Kirry. +I must keep her name sweet,” he thought. + +The church bells had begun to ring, and he was telling himself that, +heavy though his heart might be, he must behave as usual. + +“She'll be going walking to church herself this morning, Nancy,” he +said, putting on his coat, “so I'll just slip across to chapel.” + +He was swinging up the path on his return home to dinner, when he heard +voices inside the house. + +“It's shocking to see the man bittending this and bittending that.” It +was Nancy; she was laying the table; there was a rattle of knives and +forks. “Bittending to ate, but only pecking like a robin; bittending to +sleep, but never a wink on the night; bittending to laugh and to +joke and wink, and a face at him like a ghose's, and his hair all +through-others. Walking about from river to quay, and going on with all +that rubbish--it's shocking, ma'am, it's shocking!” + +“Hush-a-bye, hush-a-bye!” It was the voice of Grannie, low and quavery; +she was rocking the cradle. + +“You can't spake to him neither but he's scolding you scandalous. 'I'm +not used of being cursed at,' I'm saying, 'and is it myself that has to +be tould to respect my own Kitty?' But cry shame on her I must when +I look at the lil bogh there, and it so helpless and so beautiful. +'Stericks, you say? Yes, indeed, ma'am, and if I stay here much longer, +it's losing myself I will be, too, with his bittending and bittending.” + +“Lave him to it, Nancy. His poor head's that moidered and mixed it's +like a black pudding--there's no saying what's inside of it. But he's +good, though; aw, right good he is for all, and the world's cold and +cruel. Lave him alone, woman; lave him alone, poor boy.” + +The child awoke and cried, and, under cover of this commotion and the +crowing and cooing of the two women, Pete stepped back to the gate, +clashed it hard, swung noisily up the gravel, and rolled into the house +with a shout and a laugh. + +“Well, well! Grannie, my gough! Who'd have thought of seeing Grannie, +now? And how's the ould angel to-day? So you've got the lil one there? +Aw, you rogue, you. You're on Grannie's lap, are you? How's Cæsar? And +how's Mrs. Gorry doing? Look at that now--did you ever? Opening one +eye first to make sure if the world's all right. The child's wise. +Coo--oo--oo! Smart with the dinner, Nancy--wonderful hungry the chapel's +making a man. Coo--oo! What's she like, now, Grannie?” + +“When I set her to my knee like this I can see my own lil Kirry again,'' +said Grannie, looking down ruefully, rocking the child with one knee and +doubling over it to kiss it. + +“So she's like the mammy, is she?” said Pete, blowing at the baby and +tickling its chin with his broad forefinger. “Mammy's gone to the ould +uncle's--hasn't she, my lammie?” + +At that Grannie fell to rocking herself as well as the child, and +to singing a hymn in a quavery voice. Then with a rattle and a rush, +throwing off his coat and tramping the floor in his shirt-sleeves, while +Nancy dished up the dinner, Pete began to enlarge on Kate's happiness in +the place where she had gone. + +“Tremenjous grand the ould man's house is--you wouldn't believe. A +reg'lar Dempster's palace. The grandeur on it is a show and a pattern. +Plenty to ate, plenty to drink, and a boy at the door with white buttons +dotting on his brown coat, bless you like--like a turnip-field in +winter. Then the man himself; goodness me, the happy that man is--Happy +Joe they're calling him. Wouldn't trust but he'll be taking Kate to a +theaytre. Well, and why not, if a person's down a bit? A merry touch and +go--where's the harm at all? Fact is, Grannie, that's why we couldn't +tell you Kate was going. Cæsar would have been objecting. He's fit +enough for it--ha, ha, ha!” + +Grannie looked up at Pete as he laughed, and the broad rose withered on +his face. + +“H'm! h'm!” he said, clearing his throat; “I'm bad dreadful wanting a +smook.” And past the dinner-table, now smoking and ready, he slithered +out of the house. + +Cæsar was Pete's next visitor. He said nothing of Kate, and neither did +Pete mention Uncle Joe. The interview was a brief and grim one. It was +a lie that Ross Christian had been sent by his father to ask for a loan, +but it was true that Peter Christian was in urgent need of money. He +wanted six thousand pounds as mortgage on Ballawhaine. Had Pete got +so much to lend? No need for personal intercourse; Cæsar would act as +intermediary. + +Pete took only a moment for consideration. Yes, he had got the money, +and he would lend it. Cæsar looked at Pete; Pete looked at Cæsar. “He's +talking all this rubbish,” thought Cæsar, “but he knows where the girl +has gone to. He knows who's taken her; he manes to kick the rascal out +of his own house neck and crop; and right enough, too, and the Lord's +own vengeance.” + +But Pete's thoughts were another matter. “The ould man won't live to +redeem it, and the young one will never try--it'll do for Philip some +day.” + + + + +II. + +For three days Pete bore himself according to his wont, thinking to +silence the evil tongues of the little world about him, and keep sweet +and alive the dear name which they were waiting to befoul and destroy. +By Tuesday morning the strain had become unbearable. On pretences of +business, of pleasure, of God knows what folly and nonsense, he began to +scour the island. He visited every parish on the north, passed +through every village, climbed every glen, found his way into every +out-of-the-way hut, and scraped acquaintance with every old woman living +alone. Sometimes he was up in the vague fore-dawn, creeping through the +quiet streets like a thief, going silently, stealthily, warily, until +he came to the roads, or the fields, or the open Curragh, and could give +swing to his step, and breath to his lungs, and voice to the cries that +hurst from him. + +Two long weeks he spent in this wild quest, and meanwhile he was as +happy as a boy to all outward seeming--whistling, laughing, chaffing, +bawling, talking nonsense, any nonsense, and kicking up his heels like +a kid. But wheresoever he went, and howsoever early he started on his +errands, he never failed to be back at home at seven o'clock in the +evening--washed, combed, in his slippers and shirt-sleeves, smoking a +long clay over the garden gate as the postman went by with the letters. + +“She'll write,” he told himself. “When she's mending a bit she'll +aise our mind and write. 'Dear ould Pete, excuse me for not writing +afore'--that'll he the way of it. Aw, trust her, trust her.” + +But day followed day, and no letter came from Kate. Ten evenings running +he smoked over the gate, leisurely, largely, almost languidly, hut +always watching for the peak of the postman's cap as it turned the +corner by the Court-house, and following the toes of his foot as they +stepped off the curb, to see if they pointed in his direction--and then +turning aside with a deep breath and a smothered moan that ended in a +rattle of the throat and a pretence at spitting. + +The postman saw him as he went by, and his little eyes twinkled +treacherously. + +“Nothing for you yet, Capt'n,” he said at length. + +“Chut!” said Pete, with a mighty puff of smoke; “my business isn't done +by correspondence, Mr. Kelly.” + +“Aw, no; but when a man's wife's away----” began the postman. + +“Oh, I see,” said Pete, with a look of intelligence, and then, with +a lofty wave of the hand, “She's like her husband, Mr. Kelly--not +bothering much with letters at all.” + +“You'll be longing for a line, though, Capt'n--that's only natural.” + +“No news is good news--I can lave it with her.” + +“Of coorse, that's truth enough, yes! But still and for all, a taste of +a letter--it's doing no harm, Capt'n--aisy writ, too, and sweet to get +sometimes, you know--shows a woman isn't forgetting a man when she's +away.” + +“Mr. Kelly! Mr. Kelly!” said Pete, with his hand before his face, palm +outwards. + +“Not necessary? Well, I lave it with you. Good-night, Capt'n.” + +“Good-night to you, sir,” said Pete. + +He had laughed and tut-tutted, and lifted his eyebrows and his hands in +mock protest and a pretence of indifference, but the postman's talk +had cut him to the quick. “People are suspecting,” he thought. “They're +saying things.” + +This made him swear, but a thought came behind that made him sweat +instead. “Philip will be hearing them. They'll be telling him she +doesn't write to me; that I don't know where she is; that she has left +me, and that she's a bad woman.” + +To make Kate stand well with Philip was an aim that had no rival but +one in Pete's reckoning--to make Philip stand well with Kate. Out of +the shadow-land of his memory of the awful night of his bereavement, a +recollection, which had been lying dead until then, came back now in +its grave-clothes to torture him. It was what Cæsar had said of Philip's +fight with Ross Christian. Philip himself had never mentioned it--that +was like him. But when evil tongues told of Ross and hinted at mischief, +Philip would know something already; he would be prepared, perhaps he +would listen and believe. + +Two days longer Pete sat in the agony of this new terror and the dogged +impatience of his old hope. “She'll write. She'll not lave me much +longer.” But she did not write, and on the second night, before +returning to the house from the gate, he had made his plan. He must +silence scandal at all hazards. However his own heart might bleed with +doubts and fears and misgivings, Philip must never cease to think that +Kate was good and sweet and true. + +“Off to bed, Nancy,” he cried, heaving into the hall like a man in +drink. “I've work to do to-night, and want the house to myself.” + +“Goodness me, is it yourself that's talking of bed, then?” said Nancy. +“Seven in the everin', too, and the child not an hour out of my hands? +And dear knows what work it is if you can't be doing it with good people +about you.” + +“Come, get off, woman; you're looking tired mortal. The lil one's +ragging you ter'ble. But what's it saying, Nancy--bed is half bread. +Truth enough, too, and the other half is beauty. Get off, now. You're +spoiling your complexion dreadful--I'll never be getting that husband +for you.” + +Thus coaxing her, cajoling her, watching her, dodging her, nagging +her, driving her, he got her off to bed at last. Being alone, he looked +around, listened, shut the doors of the parlour and the kitchen, put the +bolt on the door of the stairs, the chain on the door of the porch, +took off his boots, and went about on tiptoe. Then he blew out the lamp, +filled and trimmed and relit it, going down on the hearthrug to catch +the light of the fire. After that he settled the table, drew up the +armchair, took from a corner cupboard pens and ink, a blotting pad, +a packet of notepaper and envelopes, a stick of sealing wax, a box of +matches, a postage stamp, the dictionary, and the exercise-book in which +Kate had taught him to write. + +As the clock was striking nine, Pete was squaring himself at the table, +pen in hand, and his tongue in his left cheek. Half an hour later he was +startled, by an interruption. + +“Who's there?” he shouted in a ferocious voice, leaping up with a look +of terror, like a man caught in a crime. It was only Nancy, who had come +creeping down the stairs under pretence of having forgotten the baby's +bottle. He made a sort of apologetic growl, handed the flat bottle +through an opening like a crack, and ordered her back to bed. + +“Goodness sakes!” said Nancy, going upstairs. “Is it coining money the +man is? Or is it whisky itself that's doing on him?” + +Two hours afterwards Pete fancied he saw a face at the window, and he +caught up a stick, unchained the door, and rushed into the garden. It +was no one; the town lay asleep; the night was all but airless; only +the faintest breeze moved the leaves of the trees; there was no noise +anywhere, except the measured beat of the sea in its everlasting coming +and going on the shore. + +Stepping back into the house, where the fire chirped and the kettle sang +and all else was quiet, he resumed his task, and somewhere in the dark +hours before the dawn he finished it. The fingers of his right hand were +then inky up to the first joint, his collar was open, his neck was bare, +his eyes were ablaze, the cords on his face were big and blue, great +beads of cold sweat were standing on his forehead, and the carpet around +his chair was littered as white as if a snowstorm had fallen on it. + +He went down on his knees and gathered up these remnants and burnt them, +with the air of a man destroying the evidences of his guilt. Then he put +back the ink and the dictionary, the blotting pad and sealing wax, and +replaced them with a loaf of bread, a table knife, a bottle of brandy, +and a drinking glass. After that he made up the fire with a shovel of +slack, that it might burn until morning; removed the lamp from the table +to the window recess that it might cast its light into the darkness +outside; and unchained the outer door that a wanderer of the night, if +any such there were, might enter without knocking. + +He did all this in the absent manner of a man who did it nightly. Then +unbolting the staircase door, and listening a moment for the breathing +of the sleepers overhead, he crept into the dark parlour overlooking the +road, and lay down on the sofa to sleep. + +It was done! Pete's great scheme was afoot! The mighty secret which he +had enshrouded with such awful mystery lay in an envelope in the +inside breast-pocket of his monkey-jacket, signed, sealed, stamped, and +addressed. + +_Pete had written a letter to himself_. + + + + +III. + +Next day the crier was crying: “Great meeting--Manx fishermen--on Zigzag +at Peel when boats come in to-morrow morning--protest agen harbour +taxes.” + +“The thing itself,” thought Pete, with his hand pressed hard on the +outside of his breast-pocket. At five o'clock in the afternoon he went +down to the harbour, where his Nickey lay by the quay, shouted to the +master, “Take an odd man tonight, Mr. Kemish?” then dropped to the deck +and helped to fetch the boat into the bay. + +They had to haul her out by poles alone the quay wall, for the tide +was low, and there was no breakwater. It was still early in the herring +season, but the fishing was in full swing. Five hundred boats from all +parts were making for the fishing round. It lay off the south-west tail +of the island. Before Pete's boat reached it the fleet were sitting +together, like a flight of sea-fowl, and the sun was almost gone. + +The sun went down that night over the hills of Mourne very angry and red +in its setting; the sky to the north-west was dark and sullen; the round +line of the sea was bleared and broken, but there was little wind, and +the water was quiet. + +“Bring to and shoot,” cried Pete, and they dropped sail to the landward +of the fleet, off the shoulder of the Calf Island, with its two lights +making one. The boat was brought head to the wind, with the flowing tide +veering against her; the nets were shot over the starboard quarter, and +they dropped astern; the bow was swung round to the line of the floating +mollags, and boat and nets began to drift together. + +Supper was served, the pump was worked, the lights were run up, the +small boat was sent round with a flare to fright away the evil spirits, +and then the night came down--a dark night, without moon or stars, +shutting out the island, though it stood so near, and even the rocks +of the Hen and Chicken. The first man for the look-out took up his one +hour's watch at the helm, and the rest went below. + +Pete's bunk was under the binnacle, and the light of its lamp fell on +a stamped envelope which he took out of his breast-pocket from time to +time that he might read the inscription. It ran-- + + Capn Peatr Quilliam, + + Lm Cottig Ramsey I O Man. + +He looked at it lovingly, fondly, yearningly, yet with a certain awe, +too, as if it were the casket of some hidden treasure, and he hardly +knew what it contained. The dim-lit cabin was quiet, the net boiler +sparched drops of hot water at intervals, the fire of the cooking stove +slid and fell, the men breathed heavily from unseen beds, and the sea +washed as the boat rolled. + +“What's she saying, I wonder! I wonder! God bless her!” he mumbled, and +then he, too, fell asleep. + +Two hours before hauling, they proved the fishing by taking in a “pair” + of the net, found good herring, and blew the horn as signal that they +were doing well. Then out of the black depths around, wherein no boat +could be seen, the lights of other boats came floating silently astern, +until the company about them in the darkness was like a little city of +the sea and the night. + +At the first peep of morning over the round shoulder of the Calf, the +little city awoke. There were the clicks of the capstan, and the shouts +of the men as the nets came back to the boats, heavy and white with +fish. All being aboard, the men went down on the deck, according to +their wont, every man on his knee with his face in his cap, and then +leapt up with a shout (perhaps an oath), swung to the wind, hoisted the +square sails, and made for home. The dark northwest was lowering by this +time, and the sea was beginning to jump. + +“Breakfast, boys,” sang out Pete, with his head above the companion, and +all but the helmsman went below. There was a pot full of the drop-fish, +and every man ate his warp of herring. It had been a great night's +fishing. Some of the boats were full to the mouth, and all had plenty. + +“We'll do middling if we get a market,” said Pete. + +“We've got to get home first,” said the master, and at the same moment +a sea struck the windward quarter with the force of a sledge-hammer, and +the block at the masthead began to sing. + +“We'll run for Peel this morning, boys,” said Pete, smothering his voice +in a mouthful. + +“Peel?” said the master, shooting out his lip. “They've got no harbour +there at all with a cat's paw of a breeze, let alone a northwester.” + +“I'm for going up to the meeting,” said Pete in an incoherent way. + +Then they tacked before the rising gale, and went off with the fleet +as it swirled like a flight of gulls abreast of the wind. The sea came +tumbling down like a shoal of seahogs, and washed the faces of the men +as they sat in oilskins on the hatch-head, shaking the herring out of +the nets into the hold. + +But their work only began when they came into Peel. The tide was down; +there was no breakwater; the neck of the harbour was narrow, and four +hundred boats were coming to take shelter and to land their cargoes. It +was a scene of tumult and confusion--shouting, swearing, and fighting +among the men, and crushing and cranching among the boats as they nosed +their way to the harbour mouth, threw ropes on to the quay, where fifty +ropes were round one post already, or cast anchors up the bank of the +castle rock, which was steep and dangerous to lie on. + +Pete got landed somehow, but his Nickey with half the fleet turned +tail and went round the island. As he leapt ashore, the helpless +harbour-master, who had been bellowing over the babel through a cracked +trumpet, turned to him and said, “For the Lord's sake, Capt'n Quilliam, +if you've got a friend that can lend us a hand, go off to the meeting at +seven o'clock.” + +“I mane to,” said Pete, but he had something else to do first. It was +the task that had brought him to Peel, and no eye must see him do it. +Slowly and slyly, like one who does a doubtful thing and pretends to +be doing nothing, he went stealing through the town--behind the old +Court-house and up Castle Street, into the market-place, and across it +to the line of shops which make the principal thoroughfare. + +At one of these shops, a little single-roomed place, with its small +shutter still up, but the door half open and a noise of stamping going +on inside, he stopped in a lounging way, half twisting on his heel as if +idly looking back. It was the Post-Office. + +With a stealthy look around, he put a trembling hand into his +breast-pocket, drew out the letter, screened it by the flat of his big +palm, and posted it. Then he turned hurriedly away, and was gone in a +moment, like a man who feared pursuit, down a steep and tortuous alley +that led to the shore. The morning was early; the shops were not yet +open; only the homes of the fishermen were putting out curling wreaths +of smoke; the silent streets echoed to his lightest footstep. + +But the shore road was busy enough. Fishermen in sea-boots and +sou'westers, with oilskin over one arm and a string of herring in the +other hand, were trooping from the harbour up to the Zigzag by the rock +called the Creg Malin. It was at the end of the bay, where cliff and +beach and sea together form a bag like the cod-end of the trawl net. + +“It's not the fishermen at all--it's the farmers they're thinking of,” + said one. + +“You're right,” said Pete, “and it's some of ourselves that's to blame +for it.” + +“How's that?” said somebody. + +“Aisy enough,” said Pete. “When I came home from Kimberly I met an ould +fisherman--_you_ know the man, Billy--well, _you_ do, Dan--Phil Nelly, +of Ramsey. 'How's the fishing, Phil?' says I. He gave me a Hm! and a +heise of his neck, and 'I'm not fishing no more,' says he. 'The wife's +keeping a private hotel,' says he. 'And what are you doing yourself,' +says I. 'I'm walking about,' says he, and, gough bless me, if the +man wasn't wearing a collar and carrying a stick, and prating about +advertising the island, if you plaze.” + +At the sound of Pete's voice a group of the men gathered about him. +“That's not the worst neither,” said he. “The other day I tumbled +over Tom Hommy--_you_ know Tom Hommy, yes, you do, the lil deaf man up +Ballure. He was lying in the hedge by the public-house, three sheets in +the wind. 'Why aren't you out with the boats, Tom?' says I. 'Wash for +should I go owsh wish the boash, when the childer can earn more on the +roads?' says the drunken wastrel. 'And is yonder your boys and girls +tossing summersaults at the tail of the trippers' car?' says I. 'Yesh,' +says he; 'and they'll earn more in a day at their caperings than their +father in a week at the herrings.'” + +“I believe it enough,” said one. “The man's about right,” said another; +and a querulous voice behind said, “Wonderful the prosperity of the +island since the visitors came to it.” + +“Get out with you, there, for a disgrace to the name of Manxman,” sang +out Pete over the heads of those that stood between. “With the farming +going to the dogs and the fishing going to the divil, d'ye know what +the ould island's coming to? It's coming to an island of lodging-house +keepers and hackney-car drivers. Not the Isle of Man at all, but the +Isle of Manchester.” + +There was a tremendous shout at this last word. In another minute Pete +was lifted shoulder high over the crowd on to the highest turn of the +zigzag path, and bidden to go on. There were five hundred faces below +him, putting out hot breath in the cool morning air. The sun was +shooting over the cliffs a canopy as of smoke above their heads. On the +top of the crag the sea-fowl were jabbering, and the white sea itself +was climbing on the beach. + +“Men,” said Pete, “there's not much to say. This morning's work said +everything. We'd a right fishing last night, hadn't we? Four hundred +boats came up to Peel, and we hadn't less than ten maise apiece. +That's--you that's smart at your figguring and ciphering, spake out +now--that's four thousand maise isn't it?” (Shouts of “Right.”) “Aw, +you're quick wonderful. No houlding you at all when it's money +that's in. Four thousand maise ready and waiting for the steamers to +England--but did we land it? No, nor half of it neither. The other +half's gone round to other ports, too late for the day's sailing, and +half of that half will be going rotten and getting chucked back into the +sea. That's what the Manx fishermen have lost this morning because they +haven't harbours to shelter them, and yet they're talking of levying +harbour dues.” + +“Man veen, he's a boy!”--“He's all that”--“Go it, Capt'n. What are we +to do?” + +“Do?” cried Pete. “I'll tell you what you're to do. This is Friday. Next +Thursday is old Midsummer Day. That's Tynwald Coort day. Come to St. +John's on Thursday--every man of you come--come in your sea-boots and +your jerseys--let the Governor see you mane it. 'Give us raisonable +hope of harbour improvement and we'll pay,' says you. 'If you don't, we +won't; and if you try to make us, we're two thousand strong, and we'll +rise like one man.'Don't be freckened; you've a right to be bould in a +good cause. I'll get somebody to spake for you. You know the man I mane. +He's stood the fisherman's friend before to-day, and he isn't going +taking off his cap to the best man that's setting foot on Tynwald Hill.” + +It was agreed. Between that day and Tynwald day Pete was to enlist the +sympathy of Philip, and to go to Port St. Mary to get the co-operation +of the south-side fishermen. The town was astir by this time, the sun +was on the beach, and the fishermen trooped off to bed. + + + + +IV. + +Pete was back in his ship's cabin in the garden the same evening with +a heart the heavier because for one short hour it had forgotten its +trouble. The flowers were opening, the roses were creeping over the +porch, the blackbird was singing at the top of the tree; but his own +flower of flowers, his rose of roses, his bird of birds--where was she? +Summer was coming, coming, coming--coming with its light, coming with +its music, coming with its sweetness--but she came not. + +The clock struck seven inside the house, and Pete, pipe in hand, swung +over to the gate. No need to-night to watch for the postman's peak, no +need to trace his toes. + +“A letter for you, Mr. Quilliam.” + +Hearing these words, Pete, his eyes half shut as if dosing in the +sunset, wakened himself with a look of astonishment. + +“What? For me, is it? A letter, you say? Aw, I see,” taking it and +turning it in his hand, “just'a line from the mistress, it's like. Well, +well! A letter for me, if you plaze,” and he laughed like a man much +tickled. + +He was in no hurry. He rammed his dead pipe with his finger, lit it +again, sucked it, made it quack, drew a long breath, and then said +quietly, “Let's see what's her news at all.” + +He opened the letter leisurely, and read bits of it aloud, as if reading +to himself, but holding the postman while he did so in idle talk on the +other side of the gate. “And how are you living to-day, Mr. Kelly? Aw, +h'm--_getting that much better_ it's extraordinary--Yes, a nice everin', +very, Mr. Kelly, nice, nice--_that happy and comfortable and Uncle +Joe is that good_--heavy bag at you to-night, you say? Aw, heavy, yes, +heavy--_love to Grannie and all inquiring friends_--nothing, Mr. Kelly, +nothing--just a scribe of a line, thinking a man might be getting +unaisy. She needn't, though--she needn't. But chut! It's nothing. +Writing a letter is nothing to her at all. Why, she'd be knocking that +off, bless you,” holding out a half sheet of paper, “in less than an +hour and a half. Truth enough, sir.” Then, looking at the letter again, +“What's this, though? PN. They're always putting a P.N. at the bottom +of a letter, Mr. Kelly. P.N.--_I was expecting to be home before, but +I wouldn't get away for Uncle Joe taking me to the theaytres_. Ha, ha, +ha! A mighty boy is Uncle Joe. But, Mr. Kelly, Mr. Kelly,” with a solemn +look, “not a word of this to Cæsar?” + +The postman had been watching Pete out of the corners of his ferret +eyes. “Do you know, Capt'n, what Black Tom is saying?” + +“What's that?” said Pete, with a sudden change of tone. + +“He's saying there _is_ no Uncle Joe.” + +“No Uncle Joe?” cried Pete, lifting voice and eyebrows together. + +The postman signified assent with a nod of his peak. + +“Well, that's rich,” said Pete, in a low breath, raising his face as +if to invoke the astonishment of the sky itself. “No Uncle Joe?” he +repeated, in a tone of blank incredulity. “Ask the man if it's in bed +he is. Why,” and Pete's eyes opened and closed like a doll's, “he'll be +saying there's no Auntie Joney next.” + +The postman looked up inquiringly. + +“Never heard of Auntie Joney--Uncle Joe's wife? No? Well, really, +really--is it sleeping I am? Not Auntie Joney, the Primitive? Aw, a good +ould woman as ever lived. A saint, if ever the like was in, and died a +triumphant death, too. No theaytres for her, though. She won't bemane +herself. No, but she's going to chapel reg'lar, and getting up in the +middle of every night of life to say her prayers. 'Deed she is. So Black +Tom says there is no Uncle Joe?” + +Pete gave a long whistle, then stopped it sudden with his mouth agape, +and said from his throat, “I see.” + +He put his mouth close to the postman's ear and whispered, “Ever hear +Black Tom talk of the fortune he's expecting through the Coort of +Chancery?” The postman's peak bobbed downwards. “You have? Tom's +thinking to grab it all for himself. Ha, ha! That's it! Ha, ha!” + +The postman went off blinking and giggling, and Pete reeled up the +path, biting his lip, and muttering, “Keep it up, Pete, keep it up--it's +ploughing a hard furrow, though.” Then aloud, “A letter from the +mistress, Nancy.” + +Nancy met him in the porch, clearing her fingers, thick with dough. + +“There you are,” said Pete, flapping the letter on one hand. + +“Good sakes alive!” said Nancy. “Did it come by the post, though, Pete?” + +“Look at the stamp, woman, and see for yourself,” said Pete. + +“My goodness me! From Kirry, you say?” + +“Let me in, then, and I'll be reading you bits.” + +Nancy went back to her kneading with looks of bewilderment, and Pete +followed her, opening the letter. + +“She's well enough, Nancy--no need to read that part at all. But see,” + running his forefinger along the writing “'_Kisses for the baby, and +love to Nancy, and tell Grannie not to be fretting?_ et setterer, et +setterer. See?” + +Nancy looked up at her thumping and thunging, and said, “Did Mr. Kelly +give it you?” + +“He did that,” said Pete, “this minute at the gate. It's his time, isn't +it?” + +Nancy glanced at the clock. “I suppose it must be right,” she said. + +“Take it in your hand, woman,” said Pete. + +Nancy cleaned her hands and took the letter, turned it over and felt it +in her fingers as if it had been linen. “And this is from Kirry, is it? +It's nice, too. I haven't much schooling, Pete, but I'm asking no better +than a letter myself. It's like a peppermint in your frock on Sunday--if +you're low you're always knowing it's there, anyway.” She looked at it +again, and then she said, like one who says a strange thing, “I once had +a letter myself--'deed I had, Pete. It was from father. He went down in +the _Black Sloop_, trading oranges with the blacks in their own island +somewhere. They put into the port of London one day when they were +having a funeral there. What's this one they were calling after the big +boots--Wellingtons, that's the man. They were writing home all about +it--the people, and the chariots, and the fighting horses, and the music +in the streets and the Cateedrals--and we were never hearing another +word from them again--never. 'To Miss Annie Cain--your affecshunet +father, Joe Cain.' I knew it all off--every word--and I kept it ten +years in my box under the lavender.” + +Philip came later. He was looking haggard and tired; his face was +pallid and drawn; his eyes were red, quick, and wandering; his hair was +neglected and ragged; his step was wavering and uncertain. + +“Gough alive, man,” cried Pete, “didn't you take oath to do justice +between man and man?” + +Philip looked up with alarm. “Well?” he said. + +“Well,” cried Pete, with a frown and a clenched fist, “there's one man +you're not doing justice to.” + +“Who's that?” said Philip with eyes down. + +“Yourself,” said Pete, and Philip drew a long breath. Pete laughed, +protested that Philip must not work so hard, and then plunged into an +account of the morning's meeting. + +“Tremenjous! Talk of enthusiasm! Man veen, man veen! Didn't I say +we'd rise as one man? We will, too. We're going up to Tynwald Coort on +Tynwald day, two thousand strong. Tynwald Coort? Yes, and why not? +Drum and fife bands, bless you--two of them. Not much music, maybe, but +there'll be noise enough. It's all settled. Southside fishermen are +coming up Foxal way; north-side men going down by Peel. Meeting under +Harry Delany's tree, and going up to the hill on mass (en masse). No +bawling, though--no singing out--no disturbing the Coort at all.” + +“Well, well! What then?” said Philip. + +“Then we're wanting you to spake for us, Dempster. Aw, nothing +much--nothing to rag you at all. Just tell them flat we won't--that'll +do.” + +“It's a serious matter, Pete. I must think it over.” + +“Aw, think and think enough, Dempster--but mind you do it, though. The +boys are counting on you. 'He's our anchor and he'll hould,' they're +saying; But, bother the harbours, anyway,” reaching his hand for +something on the mantelpiece. “What do you think?” + +“Nay,” said Philip, with a long breath of weariness and relief. + +“Guess, then,” said Pete, putting his hand behind him. + +Philip shook his head and smiled feebly. Then, with the expression of a +boy on his birthday, Pete leaned over Philip, and said in a half-whisper +across the top of his head, “I've heard from Kate.” + +Philip turned ghastly, his lip trembled, and he stammered, +“You've--you've--heard from Kate, have you?” + +“Look at that,” cried Pete, and round came the letter with a triumphant +sweep. + +Philip's respiration grew difficult and noisy. Slowly, very slowly, he +reached out his hand, took the letter, and looked at its superscription. + +“Read it--read it,” said Pete; “no secrets at all.” + +With head down and eyebrows hiding his eyes, with trembling hands +that tore the envelope, Philip took out the letter and read it in +passages--broken, blurred, smudged, as by the smoke of a fo'c'stle lamp. + + “Deerest peat i am gettin that much better... i am that + happy and comforbel... sometimes i am longing for a sight of + the lil ones swate face... no more at present... ure own + trew wife.” + +“Come to the P. N. yet, Philip?” said Pete. He was on his knees before +the fire, lighting his pipe with a red coal. + + “axpectin to be home sune but... give my luv and bess + respects to the Dempster when you see him he was so good to me + when “were forren the half was never towl you” + +“She's not laving a man unaisy, you see,” said Pete. + +Philip could not speak. His throat was choking; his tongue filled his +mouth; his eyes were swimming in tears that scorched them. Nancy, who +had been up to Sulby with news of the letter, came in at the moment, and +Philip raised his head. + +“I told my aunt not to expect me to-night, Nancy. Is my room upstairs +ready?” + +“Aw, yes, always ready, your honour,” said Nancy, with a curtsey. + +He got up, with head aside, took a candle from Nancy's hand, excused +himself to Pete--he was tired, sleepy, had a heavy day to-morrow--said +“Good-night,” and went upstairs--stumbling and floundering--tore open +his bedroom door, and clashed it back like a man flying from an enemy. + +Pete thought he had succeeded to admiration, but he looked after Philip, +and was not at ease. He had no misgivings. Writing was writing to him, +and it was nothing more. But in the deep midnight, Philip, who had not +slept, heard a thick voice that was like a sob coming from somewhere +downstairs. He opened his door, crept out on to the stairhead, and +listened. The house was dark. In some unseen place the voice was +saying-- + +“Lord, forgive me for deceaving Philip. I couldn't help it, though; +Thou knows, Thyself, I couldn't. A lie's a dirty thing, Lord. It's like +chewing dough--it sticks in your throat and chokes you. But I had to +do it to save my poor lost lamb, and if I didn't I should go mad +myself--Thou knows I should. So forgive me, Lord, for Kirry's sake. +Amen.” + +The thick voice stopped, the house lay still, then the child awoke in +a room beyond, and its thin cry came through the darkness. Philip crept +back in terror. + +“This is what _she_ had to go through! O God! My God!” + + + + +V. + +Cæsar called next day and took Pete to the office of the High Bailiff, +where the business of the mortgage was completed. The deeds of +Ballawhaine were then committed to Cæsar's care for custody and safe +keeping, and he carried them off to his safe at the mill with a long +stride and a face of fierce triumph. + +“The ould Ballawhaine is dying,” he thought; “and if we kick out the +young one some day, it'll only be the Lord's hand on a rascal.” + +On drawing his big cheque, Pete had realised that, with reckless +spending, and more reckless giving, he had less than a hundred pounds +to his credit. “No matter,” he thought; “Philip will pay me back when he +comes in to his own.” + +Grannie was with Nancy at Elm Cottage when Pete returned home. The child +was having its morning bath, and the two women were on their knees at +either side of the tub, cackling and crowing like two old hens over one +egg. + +“Aw, did you _ever_, now, Nancy? 'Deed, no; you never _did_ see such a +lil angel. Up-a-daisy!” + +“Cry I must, Grannie, when I see it looking so beautiful. Warm towels, +you say? I'm a girl of this sort--when I get my heart down, I can never +get it up again. Fuller's earth, is it? Here, then.” + +“Boo--loo--loo! the bog millish! Nancy, we must be shortening her soon.” + +And with that they fell to an earnest council on frocks and petticoats, +and other mysteries unread by man. Pete sat and watched and listened. +“People will be crying shame on her if they see the Grannie doing +everything,” he thought. + +That night he lounged through the town and examined the shop windows out +of the corner of his eye. He was trying to bear himself like a workman +enjoying his Saturday night's ramble in clean clothes, but the streets +were thronged, and he found himself observed. “Not here,” he told +himself. “I can buy nothing here. Doesn't do to be asleep at all, and a +man isn't always in bed when he's sleeping.” + +Some hours later, Nancy and the child being upstairs, Pete bethought +himself of something that was kept at the bottom of a drawer. Going to +the drawer to open it, he found it stiff to his tugging, and it came +back with a jerk, which showed it had not lately been disturbed. Pete +found what he looked for, and came upon something beside. It was a +cardboard box, tied about with a string, which was knotted in a peculiar +way. “Kate's knot,” thought Pete with a sigh. He slipped it, and opened +the lid and took out a baby's hood of scarlet plush. “The very thing,” + he thought. He held it, mouth open, over his big brown hand, and laughed +with delight. “She's been buying it for the child and never using it.” + His eyes glistened. “The _very_ thing,” he thought, and then he took +down pen and paper to write something to go with it. + +This is what he wrote-- + + “For lil Katerin from her Luvin mother” + +Then he held it at arm's length and looked at it. The subscription +crossed the whole face of a half-sheet of paper. But the triumphant +success of his former effort had made him bold. He could not resist the +temptation to write more. So he turned the paper over and wrote on the +back-- + + “tell pa pa not to wurry about me i aspect to be home sune + but dont no ezactly” + +His eyes were swimming by the time he got that down, but they brightened +again as he remembered something. + + “Weve had grate times ear uncle Jo--” + +“Must go on milking that ould cow,” he thought + + “tuk me to sea the prins of Wales yesterda” + +He could not help it--he began to take a wild joy in his own inventions. + + “flags and banns of musick all day and luminerashuns all + night it was grand we were top of an umnibuss goin down lord + strete and saw him as plane as plane” + +“Bless me,” said Pete, dropping his pen, and rubbing his hands in +ravishing contemplation of his own fiction; “the next thing we hear +she'll be riding in her carriage and' pair.” + +He was sobbing a little, for all that, in a low, smothered way, but he +could not deny himself one word more-- + + “luv to all enquirin frens and bess respecs to the Dempster + if im not forgot at him.” + +This second forgery of love being finished, he went about the house on +tiptoe, found brown paper and twine, put the hood back into the box with +his half-sheet peeping from between the frills where the little face +would go, and made it up, with his undeft fingers, into an ungainly +parcel, which he addressed to himself as before. After that he did his +accustomed duty with the lamp and the door, and lay down in the parlour +to sleep. + +On Monday, at dinner, he broke out peevishly with “Ter'ble botheration, +Nancy--I must be going to Port St. Mary about that thundering +demonstration.” + +Then from underneath the sofa in the parlour he rooted up a brown paper +parcel, stuffed it under his coat, buttoned it up, and so smuggled it +out of the house. + + + + +VI. + +They set sail early in the afternoon, and ran down the coast under a +fair breeze that made the canvas play until the sea hissed. The day was +wet and cheerless; a thick mist enshrouded the land, and going by +Laxey they could just descry the top arc of the great wheel like a +dun-coloured ghost of a rainbow in a grey sky. As they came to Douglas +the mist was lifting, but the rain was coming down in a soaking drizzle. +A band was playing dance tunes on the iron pier, which shot like a +serpent's tongue out of the mouth of the bay. The steamer from England +was coming round the head, and her sea-sick passengers were dense as a +crowd on her forward deck, the men with print handkerchiefs tied over +their caps, the women with their skirts over their drooping feathers. A +harp and a violin were scraping lively airs amidships. The town was like +a cock with his tail down crowing furiously in the wet. + +When they came to Port St. Mary the mist had risen and the rain was +gone, but the fishing-town looked black and sullen under a lowering +cloud. The tide was down, and many boats lay on the beach and in the +shallow water within the rocks. + +Pete was put ashore; his Nickey went round the Calf to the herring +ground beyond the shoulder; a number of fishermen were waiting for him +on the quay, with heavy looks and hands deep in their trousers-pockets. + +“No need for much praiching at all,” said Pete, pointing to the boats +lying aground. “There you are, boys, fifty of you at the least, with no +room to warp for the rocks. Yet they're for taxing you for dues for a +harbour.” + +“Go ahead, Capt'n,” said one of the fishermen; “there's five hundred men +here to back you up through thick and thin.” + +Pete posted his brown paper parcel as stealthily as he had posted his +letter, and left Port St. Mary the same night for Douglas. The roads +were thick with coaches, choked full with pleasure-seekers from Port +Erin. These cheerful souls were still wearing the clothes which had been +drenched through in the morning; their boots were damp and cold; they +were chill with the night-air, but they did not repine. They sang and +laughed and ate oranges, drew up frequently at wayside houses, and +handed round bottles of beer with the corks drawn. In their own way they +were bright and cheerful company. Sometimes “Hold the Fort,” sung in a +brake going ahead, mingled with “Molly and I and the Baby,” from lusty +throats coming behind. Battling through Castletown, they shouted wild +chaff at the redcoats lounging by the Castle, and when the darkness fell +they dropped asleep--the men usually on the women's shoulders; and then +the horses' hoofs were heard splashing along the muddy road, and every +rider cracked his whip over a chorus of stertorous snores. + +Douglas was ablaze with light as they dipped down to it from the dark +country. Long sinuous tails of light where the busy streets were, +running in and out, this way and that, and belching into the wide +squares and market-places like the race of a Curragh fire. The sleepers +awoke and shook themselves. “Going to the Castle to-night?” said one. +“What do you think?” said another, and they all laughed at the foolish +question. + +“I'll sleep here,” thought Pete. “I've not searched Douglas yet.” + +The driver found him a bed at his mother's house. It was a lodging-house +in Church Street, overlooking the churchyard. Finding himself so near +to Athol Street, Pete thought he would look at the outside of Philip's +chambers. He lit on the house easily, though the street was dark. It +was one of a line of houses having brass plates, each with its name, and +always the word _Advocate_. Philip's house bore one plate only, a small +one, with the name hardly legible in the uneertain light. It ran--_The +Deemster Christian_. + +Having spelt out this inscription, Pete crept away. That was the last +house in the island at which he wished to call. He was almost afraid +of being seen in the same town. Philip might think he was in Douglas to +look for Kate. + +Pete rambled through the narrow thoroughfares of Post-Office Place, +Heywood Lane, and Fancy Street, until he came to the sea front. It was +now full tide of busy night, and the holiday town seemed to be given +over to enjoyment. The steps of the terraces were thronged; itinerant +photographers pitched their cameras on the curb-stones; every open +window had its dark heads with the light behind; pianos were clashing in +the houses, harps were twanging in the street, tinkling tram-cars, like +toast-racks, were sweeping the curve of the bay; there was a steady flow +of people on the pavement, and from water's edge to cliff top, three +parts round like a horse's shoe, the town flashed and fizzed and +sparkled and blazed under its thousand lights with the splendour of a +forest fire. + +Pete called to mind the blinking and groping of the dear old half-lit +town to the north; he remembered the dark village at the foot of the +lonely hills, with its trout-stream burrowing under the low bridge, and +he thought, “She may have tired of it all, poor thing!” + +He looked at every woman's face as she went by him, hungering for one +glimpse of a face he feared to see. He did not see it, and he wandered +like a lost soul through the little gay town until he drifted with the +wave that flowed around the bay into the place that was known as the +Castle. + +It was a dancing palace in a garden, built in the manner of a +conservatory, with the ground level for those who came to dance, and +the galleries for such as came to see. Seated by the front rail of the +gallery, Pete peered down into the faces below. Three thousand young men +and young women were dancing, the men in flannels and coloured scarves, +the women in light muslins and straw hats. Sometimes the white lights in +the glass roof were coloured with red and blue and yellow. The low buzz +of the dancers' feet, the clang and clash of the brass instruments, the +boom of the big drum, the quake of the glass house itself, and the low +rumble of the hollow floor beneath--it was like a battle-field set to +music. + +“She may have tired, poor thing; God knows she may,” thought Pete. + +His eyes were growing hazy and his head dizzy, when he became conscious +of a waft of perfume behind him, and a soft voice saying at his ear, +“Were you looking for anybody, then?” + +He turned with a start, and looked at the speaker. It was a young girl +with a pretty face, thick with powder. He could not be angry with the +little thing; she was so young, and she was smiling. + +“Yes,” he said, “I _was_ looking for somebody;” and then he tried to +shake her off. + +“Is it Maudie, you mane, dear? Are you the young man from Dublin?” + +“Lave me, my girl; lave me,” said Pete, patting her hand, and twisting +about. + +The girl looked at him with a sort of pity, and then close at his neck +she said, “A fine boy like you shouldn't be going fretting his heart +about the best girl that's in.” + +He looked at the pretty face again, and the little knowing airs began to +break down. “You're a Manx girl, aren't you?” + +The smile vanished like a flash. “How do you know that? My tongue +doesn't tell you, does it?” And the little thing was ashamed. + +Pete took the tight-gloved fingers in his big palm. “So you're my lil +countrywoman, then?” he said. “How old are you?” + +The painted lips began to tremble. “Sixteen for harvest,” she answered. + +“My God!” exclaimed Pete. + +The darkened eyelids blinked; she was beginning to cry. “It wasn't my +fault. He was a visitor with my mother at Ballaugh, and he left me to +it.” + +Pete took a sovereign out of his pocket, and shut it in the girl's hand. + +“Go home to-night, my dear,” he whispered, and then he clambered out of +the place. + +“Not there!” cried Pete in his heart; “not there--I swear to God she is +not there.” + +That ended his search. He resolved to go home the same night, and he +went back to his lodgings to pay his bill. Turning out of Athol Street, +Pete was almost overrun by a splendid equipage, with two men in buff +on the box-seat, and one man behind. “The Governor's carriage,” said +somebody. At the next moment it drew up at Philip's door, its occupant +alighted, and then it swung about and moved away. “It was the young +Deemster,” said a girl to her companion, as she went skipping past. + +Pete had seen the tall, dark figure, bent and feeble, as it walked +heavily up the steps. “Truth enough,” he thought, “there's nothing got +in this world without paying the price of it.” + +It was three in the morning when Pete reached Ramsey, Elm Cottage was +dark and silent. He had to knock again and again before awakening Nancy. +“Now, if this had been Kate!” he thought, and a new fear took hold of +him. His poor darling, his wandering lamb, could she have knocked twice? +Where was she to-night? He had been picturing her in happiness and +plenty--was she in poverty and distress? All the world was sleeping--was +she asleep? His hope was slipping away; his great faith was breaking +down. “Lord, do not forsake me! Master, strengthen me! My poor lost +love, where is she? What is she? Shall I see her face again?” + +Something cold touched his hand. It was the dog. Without a bark he had +put his nose into Pete's palm. “What, Dempster, man, Dempster!” The +bat's ears were cocked--Pete felt them--the scut of a tail was wagged, +and Pete got comfort from the battered old friend that had tramped the +world at his heels. + +Nancy unchained the door, opened it an inch, held a candle over her +head, and peered out. “My goodness, is it the man himself? However did +you come home?” + +“By John the Flayer's pony,” said Pete; and he laughed and made light of +his night-long walk. + +But next morning, when Nancy came downstairs with the child, Pete +was busy with a screwdriver taking the chain off the door. “Ter'ble +ould-fashioned, these chains--must be moving with the times, you know.” + +“Then what are you putting in its place?” said Nancy. + +“You'll see, you'll see,” said Pete. + +At seven that night Pete was smoking over the gate when Kelly the Thief +came up with a brown paper parcel. “Parcel for you, Mr. Quilliam,” said +the postman, with the air of a man who knew something he should not +know. + +Pete blinked and looked bewildered. “You don't say!” he said. + +“Well, if that's your name,” began the postman, holding the address for +Pete to read. + +Pete gave it a searching look. “Cap'n Peatr Quilliam, that's it +sartenly, _Lm Cottig_--yes, it must be right,” he said, taking the +parcel gingerly. Then with a prolonged “O----o!” shutting his eyes and +nodding his head, “I know--a bit of a present from the mother to the lil +one. Wonderful thoughtful a woman is about a baby when she's a mother, +Mr. Kelly.” + +The postman giggled, threw his finger seaward over one shoulder, and +said, “Why aren't you writing back to her, then?” + +“What's that?” said Pete sharply, making the parcel creak. + +“Why aren't you writing to tell her how the lil one is, I'm saying?” + +Pete looked at the postman as if the idea had dropped from heaven. “I +must have a head as thick as a mooring-post, Mr. Kelly. Do you know, I +never once thought of it. I'm like Goliath when he got little David's +stone at his forehead--such a thing never entered my head before.” + +“Do it for all, Mr. Quilliam,” said the postman, moving off. + +“I will, I will,” said Pete; and then he turned into the house. + +“Scissors, Nancy,” he shouted, throwing the parcel on the table. + +“My sakes, a parcel!” cried Nancy. + +“Aisy to tell where it comes from, too. See that knot, woman?” said +Pete, with a knowing wink. + +“What in the world is it, Pete?” said Nancy. + +“I wonder!” said Pete. “Papers enough round it, anyway. A letter? We'll +look at that after,” he said loftily, and then out came the scarlet +hood. “Gough bless mee what's this thing at all?” and he held it up by +the crown. + +Nancy made a cry of alarm, took the hood out of his hand, and scolded +him roundly. “These men, they're fit to spoil an angel's wings.” + +Then she whipped up the baby out of the cradle, tried the hood on the +little round head, and shouted with delight. + +“Now I was thinking of that, d'ye know?” she said. “I was, yes, I was; +believe me or not, I was. 'Kirry will be sending something for the lil +one the next time she writes,' I was thinking, and behould ye--here it +is.” + +“Something spakes to us, Nancy,” said Pete. “'Deed it does, though.” + +The child gurgled and purred, and for all her fine headgear she was +absorbed in her bare toes. + +“And there's yourself, Pete--going to Peel and to Douglas, and I don't +know where--and you've never once thought of the lil one--and knowing we +were for shortening her, too.” + +Pete cast down his head and looked ashamed. + +“Well, no--of coorse--I never have--that's truth enough,” he faltered. + + + + +VII. + +Pete went out to buy a sheet of notepaper and an envelope, a pen, and a +postage stamp. He had abundance of all theso at home, but that did not +serve his turn. Going to as many shops as might be, he dropped hints +everywhere of the purpose to which his purchases were to be put. +Finally, he went to the barber's in the market-place and said, “Will you +write an address for me, Jonaique?” + +“Coorse I will,” said the barber, sweeping a hand of velvet over one +cheek of the postman, who was in the chair, leaving the other cheek in +lather while he took up the pen. + +“Mistress Peter Quilliam, care of Master Joseph Quilliam, Esquire, +Scotland Road, Liverpool” dictated Pete. + +“What number, Capt'n?” said Jonaique. + +“Number?” said Pete, perplexed. “Bless me, what's this the number is +now? Oh,” by a sudden inspiration, “five hundred and fifteen.” + +“Five hundred--d'ye say _five_” said the postman from the half of his +mouth that was clear. + +“Five,” said Pete emphatically. “Aw, they're well up.” + +“If _you_ say so, Capt'n,” said the barber, and down went “515.” + +Pete returned home with the stamped and addressed envelope open in his +hands, “Clane the table quick,” he shouted; “I must be writing to Kirry. +Will I give her your love, Nancy?” + +With much hem-ing and ha-ing and clearing of his throat, Pete was +settling himself before a sheet of note-paper, when the door opened, and +Philip stepped into the house. His face was haggard and emaciated; his +eyes burned as with a fire that came up from within. + +“I've come to warn you,” he said; “you are in great danger. You must +stop that demonstration.” + +“Sit down, sir, sit down,” said Pete. + +Philip did not seem to hear. He walked to and fro with short, nervous, +noiseless steps. “The Governor sent for me last night, and I found +him in a frenzy. 'Deemster,' he said, 'they tell me there's to be a +disturbance at Tynwald--have you heard of anything?' I said, 'Yes, I had +heard of a meeting of fishermen at Peel.' 'They talk of their +rights,' said he; 'I'll teach them something of one right they seem +to forget--the right of the Governor to shoot down the disturbers of +Tynwald, without judge or jury.' 'That's a very old prerogative, your +Excellency,' I said; 'it comes down from more lawless days than ours. +You will never use it.' 'Will I not?' said he. 'Listen, I'll tell you +what I've done already. I've ordered the regiment at Castletown to be +on Tynwald Hill on Tynwald day. Every man of these--there are three +hundred--shall have twenty rounds of ball-cartridge. Then, if the +vagabonds try to interrupt the Court, I've only to lift my hand--so--and +they'll be mown down like grass.' 'You can't mean it,' I said, and I +tried to take his big talk lightly. 'Judge for yourself--see,' and +he showed me a paper. It was an order for the ambulance waggons to be +stationed on the ground, and a request to the doctors of Douglas to be +present.” + +“Then we've made the ould boy see that we mane it,” said Pete. + +“'If you know any one of the ringleaders, Deemster,' he said, with a +look into my face--somebody had been with him--there are tell-tales +everywhere----” + +“It's the way of the world still,” said Pete. + +“'Tell him,' said he, 'that I don't want to take the life of any man--I +don't want to send any one to penal servitude.'” It was useless +to protest. The man was mad, but he was in earnest. His plan was +folly--frantic folly--but it was based on a sort of legal right. “So, for +the Lord's sake, Pete, stop this thing. Stop it at once, and finally. +It's life or death. If ever you thought my word worth anything, you'll +do as I bid you, now. God knows where I should be myself if the Governor +were to do what he threatens. Stop it, stop it; I haven't slept for +thinking of it.” + +Pete had been sitting at the table, chewing the tip of the pen, and now +he lifted to the paleness and wildness of Philip's face a cool, bold +smile. + +“It's good of you, Phil.... We've a right to be there, though, haven't +we?” + +“You've a right, certainly, but----” + +“Then, by gough, we'll go,” said Pete, dropping the pen, and bringing +his fist down on the table. + +“The penalty will be yours, Pete--yours. You are the man who will +suffer--you first--you alone.” + +Pete smiled again. “No use--I'm incorr'iblê. I'm like Dan-ny-Clae, +the sheep-stealer, when he came to die. 'I'm going to eternal +judgment--what'll I do?' says Dan. 'Give back all you've stolen,' says +the parzon. 'I'll chance it first,' says the ould rascal. It's the other +fellow that's for stealing this time; but I'll chance it, Philip. Death +it may be, and judgment too, but I'll chance it, boy.” + +Philip's eyes wandered over the floor. “Then you'll not change your plan +for anything I've told you?” + +“I will, though,” said Pete, “for one thing, anyway. _You_ shan't be +getting into trouble--I'll be spokesman for the fishermen myself. Oh, +I'll spake enough if they get my dander up. I'll just square my arms +acrost my chest and I'll say, 'Your Excellency,' I'll say, 'you can't +do it, and you shan't do it--_because it isn't_ right.' But chut! +botheration to all such bobbery! Look here--man alive, look here! She's +not forgetting the lil one, you see,” and, making a proud sweep of the +hand, Pete pointed to the scarlet hood. It had been put to sit across +the back of a china dog on the mantelpiece, with Pete's half sheet of +paper pinned to the strings. + +Philip recognised it. The hood was the present he had made as godfather. +His eyes blinked, his mouth twitched, the cords of his forehead moved. + +“So she--she sent that,” he stammered. + +“Listen here,” said Pete, and he unpinned the paper and read the message +aloud, with flourishes of voice and gesture--“For lil Katherine from her +loving mother... papa not to worry... love to all inquiring friends... +best respects to the Dempster if Im not forgot at him.” Then in an +off-hand way he tossed the paper into the fire. “Aw, what's a bit of a +letter,” he said largely, as it took flame and burned. + +Philip's bloodshot eyes seemed to be starting from his head. + +“Nancy's right--a man would never have thought of the like of that--now, +would he?” said Pete, looking proudly from Philip to the hood, and from +the hood back to Philip. + +Philip did not answer. Something seemed to be throttling him. + +“But when a woman goes away she leaves her eyes behind her, as you might +say. 'What'll I be getting for them that's at home?' she's thinking, +and up comes a nice warm lil thing for the baby. Aw, the women's good, +Philip. They're what they make the sovereigns of, God bless them!” + +Philip felt as if he must rush out of the house shrieking. One moment he +stood up before Pete, as though he meant to say something, and then he +turned to go. + +“Not sleeping to-night, no? Have to get back to Douglas? Then maybe +you'll write me a letter first?” + +Philip nodded his head and returned, his mouth tightly closed, sat down +at the table, and took up the pen. + +“What is it?” he asked. + +“Am I to give you the words, Phil? Yes? Well, if you won't be thinking +mane----” + +Pete charged His pipe out of his waistcoat pocket, and began to dictate: + + “Dear wife.'” + +At that Philip gave an involuntary cry. + +“Aw, best to begin proper, you know. 'Dear wife,'” said Pete again. + +Philip made a call on his resolution, and put the words down. His hand +felt cold; his heart felt frozen to the core. Pete lit up, and walked +to and fro as he dictated his letter. Nancy sat knitting by the cradle, +with one foot on the rocker. + + “'Glad to get your welcome letter, darling, and the bonnet + for the baby'-----” + +“'Go on,” said Philip, in an impassive voice. + +“Got that down, Philip? Aw, you're smart wonderful with the pen, +though.... + + 'When she's got it on her lil head you'd laugh tremenjous. + She's straight like a lil John the Baptist in the church + window'--” + +Pete paused; Philip lifted his pen and waited. + +“Done already? Man veen, there's no houlding you.... + + 'Glad to hear you're so happy and comfortable with Uncle Joe + and Auntie Joney. Give the pair of them my fond love and + best respects. We're getting on beautiful, and I'm as happy + as a sandboy. Sometimes Grannie gets a bit down with + longing, and so does Nancy, but I tell them you'll be home + for their funeral sarmon, anyway, and then they're comforted + wonderful.'” + +“Don't be writing his rubbage and lies, your Honour,” said Nancy. + +“Chut! woman; where's the harm at all? A merry touch to keep a person's +spirits up when she's away from home--eh, Philip?” and Pete appealed to +him with a nudge at his writing elbow. + +Philip gave no sign. With a look of stupor he was staring down at the +paper as he wrote. Pete puffed and went on-- + + “'Cæsar's at it still, going through the Bible same as a + trawl-boat, fishing up the little texes. The Dempster's + putting a sight on us reg'lar, and you're not forgot at him + neither. 'Deed no, but thinking of you constant, and + trusting you're the better for laving home-----' + +... Going too fast, am I? So I'm bating you at last, eh?” + +A cold perspiration had broken out on Philip's forehead, and he was +looking up with the eyes of a hunted dog. + +“Am I to--must I write that?” he said in a helpless way. + +“Coorse--go ahead,” said Pete, puffing clouds of smoke, and laughing. + +Philip wrote it. His hand was now stiff. It sprawled and splashed over +the paper. + + “'As for myself, I'm a sort of a grass-widow, and if you + keep me without a wife much longer they'll be taxing me for + a bachelor.'” + +Pete put his pipe on the mantelpiece, cleared his throat repeatedly, and +began to be afflicted with a cough. + + “'Glad to hear you're coming home soon, darling (_cough_). + Dearest Kirry, I'm missing you mortal (_cough_), worse nor + at Kimberley (_cough_). When I'm going to bed, 'Where is she + to-night?' I'm saying. And when I'm getting up, 'Where is + she now?' I'm thinking. And in the dark midnight I'm asking + myself, 'Is she asleep, I wonder?' (_Cough, cough_.) Come + home quick, bogh; but not before you're well at all.' + +... Never do to fetch her too soon, you know,” he said in a whisper over +Philip's shoulder, with another nudge at his elbow. + +Philip answered incoherently, and shrank under Pete's touch as if he had +been burnt. The coughing continued; the dictating began again. + + '“I'm keeping a warm nest for you here, love. There'll be a + welcome from everybody, and nobody saying anything but the + good and the kind. So come home soon, my true lil wife, + before the foolish ould heart of your husband is losing + him'----” + +Pete coughed violently, and stretched his neck and mouth awry. “This +cough I've got in my neck is fit to tear me in pieces,” he said. “A +spoonful of cold pinjane, Nancy--it's ter'ble good to soften the neck.” + +Nancy was nodding over the cradle--she had fallen asleep. + +Philip had turned white and giddy and sick. For one moment an awful +impulse seized him. He wanted to fall on Pete; to lay hold of him, to +choke him. The consciousness of his own inferiority, his own duplicity, +made him hate Pete. The very sweetness of the man sickened him. He could +not help it--the last spark of his self-pride was fighting for its life. +Then in shame, in remorse, in horror of himself and dread of everything, +he threw down the pen, caught up his hat, shouted “Good night” in a +voice like the growl of a beast in terror, and ran out of the house. + +Nancy started up from a doze. “Goodness grazhers!” she cried, and the +cradle rocked violently under her foot. + +“He's that tender-hearted and sympathising,” whispered Pete as he closed +the door. (_Cough, cough_)... “The letter's finished, though--and here's +the envelope.” + + + + +VIII. + +The following evening the Deemster was in his rooms in Athol Street. His +hat was on, his cloak was over his arm, he was resting his elbow on the +sash of the window and looking vacantly into the churchyard. Jem was +behind him, answering at his back. Their voices were low; they scarcely +moved. + +“All well upstairs?” said Philip. + +“Pretty well, your Honour.” + +“More cheerful and content?” + +“Much more, except when your Honour is from home. 'The Deemster's back,' +she'll say, and her poor face will be like sunshine on a rainy day.” + +Philip remained silent for a moment, and then said in a scarcely audible +voice-- + +“Not fretting so much about the child, Jemmy?” + +“Just as anxious to hear of it, though. 'Has he been to Ramsey to-day? +Did he see her? Is she well?' That's the word constant, sir.” + +The Deemster was silent again, and Jem was withdrawing with a deep bow. +“Jemmy, I'm going to Government House, and may be late. Don't wait up +for me.” + +Jem answered in a half whisper, “Some one waits up for your Honour +whether I do or not 'He's at home now,' she'll say, and then creep away +to bed.” + +Philip muttered, thickly and huskily, “The decanter is empty--leave out +another bottle.” Then he turned to go from the room, keeping his eyes +from his servant's face. + +He found the Governor as violent as before, and eager to fall on him +before he had time to speak. + +“They tell me. Deemster, that the leader of this rising is a sort of +left-hand relative of yours. Surely you can stop the man.” + +“I've tried to, your Excellency, and failed,” said Philip. + +The Governor tossed up his chin. “I'm told the fellow can't even write +his own name,” he said. + +“It's true,” said Philip. + +“An illiterate and utterly uneducated person.” + +“All the same, he's the wisest and strongest man on this island,” said +Philip decisively. + +The Governor frowned, and the pockmarks on his forehead seemed to swell. +“The wisest and strongest man on this island will have to leave it,” he +said. + +Philip made no answer. He had come to plead, but he saw that it was +hopeless. The Governor put his right hand in the breast, of his white +waistcoat--he was alone in the dining-room after dinner--and darted at +Philip a look of anger and command. + +“Deemster,” he said, “if, as you say, you cannot stop this low-bred +rascal, there's one thing you can do--leave him to himself.” + +“That is to say,” said Philip out of a corner of his mouth, “to you.” + +“To me be it, and who has more right?” said the Governor hotly. + +Philip held himself in hand. He was silent, and his silence was taken +for submission. Cracking some nuts and munching them, the Governor began +to take another tone. + +“I should be sorry, Mr. Christian, if anything came between you and +me--very sorry. We've been good friends thus far, and you will allow +that you owe me something. Don't you see it yourself--this man is +dishonouring me in the eyes of the island? If you have tried your best +to keep his neck out of the halter, let the consequences be his own.” + +“Eh?” said Philip, with his eyes on the floor. + +“You have done your duty by the man, I say. Help yourself to a glass of +wine.” + +Still Philip did not speak. The Governor saw his advantage, but little +did he guess the pitiless power of it. + +“The fellow is your kinsman, Deemster, and I shall not ask you to deal +with him. That would be inhuman. If there is no hope of restraining him +to-morrow--wise as he is, if he will not listen to saner counsels, I +will only beg of you--but this is a matter for the police. You are +a high official now. It would be a pity to give you pain. Stay at +home--I'll gladly excuse you--you look as if a day's rest would do you +good.” + +Philip drank two glasses of the wine in quick succession. The Governor +poured him a third, and went on-- + +“I don't know what you're feeling for the man may be--it can't be +friendship. I'm sure he's a thorn in your flesh. And as long as he's +here he will always be.” + +Philip looked up with inquiry, doubt, and fear. + +“Ah! I knew it. Even if this matter goes by, your time will come. You'll +quarrel with the fellow yet--you know you will--it's in the nature of +things--if he's the man you say.” + +Philip drank the third glass of wine and rose to go. + +“Leave him to me--I'll deal with him. You'll be done with him, and a +good riddance, too, I reckon. And now come in to the ladies--they'll +know you're here.” + +Philip excused himself and went off with feverish gestures and an +excited face. + +“The Governor is right,” he thought, as he went home over the dark +roads. Pete was a thorn in his flesh, and always would be; his enemy, +his relentless enemy, notwithstanding his love for him. + +The misery of the past month could not be supported any longer. +Perpetual fear of discovery, perpetual guard of the tongue, keeping +watch and ward on every act of life--to-day, to-morrow, the next day, +on and on until life's end in wretchedness or disgrace--it was +insupportable, it was impossible, it could not be attempted. + +Then came thoughts that were too fearful to take form-too awful to take +words. They were like the flapping of unseen wings going by him in +the night, but the meaning of them was this: If Pete persists in his +purpose, there will be a riot. If any one is injured, Pete will be +transported. If any one is killed, Pete will be indicted for his life. + +“Well, I have done my duty by him,” his heart whimpered. “I have tried +to restrain him. I have tried to restrain the Governor. It isn't my +fault. What more can I do?” + +Philip walked fast. Here was the way of escape from the evil that beset +his path. Fate was stretching out her hands to him. When men had done +wrong, they did yet more wrong to elude the consequences of their first +fault; but there was no need for that in his case. + +The hour was late. A strong breeze was blowing off the sea. It flicked +his face with salt as he went swinging down the hill into the town. His +blood was a-fire. He had a feeling, never felt before, of courage and +even ferocity. Something told him that he was not so good a man as he +had been, but it was a tingling pleasure to feel that he was a stronger +man than before. + +Should he tell Kate? No! Let the thing go on; let it end. After it was +over she would see where their account lay. Thinking in this way, he +laughed aloud. + +The town was quiet when he came to it. So absorbed had he been that, +though the air was sharp, he had been carrying his cloak over his +arm. Now he put it on, and drew the hood close over his head. A dog, a +homeless cur, had begun to follow at his heels. He drove it off, but it +continued to hang about him. At last it got in front of his feet, and he +stumbled over it in one of his large, quick strides. Then he kicked the +dog, and it crossed the dark street yelping. He was a worse man, and he +knew it. + +He let himself into the house with his latch-key, and banged the +door behind his back. But no sooner had he breathed the soft, woolly, +stagnant air within than a change came over him. His ferocious strength +ebbed away, and he began to tremble. + +The hall passage and staircase were in darkness. This was by his +orders--coming in late, he always forgot to put out the gas. But the +lamp of his room was burning on the candle rest at the stairhead, and it +cast a long sword of light down the staircase well. + +Chilled by some unknown fear, he had set one foot on the first tread +when he thought he heard the step of some one coming down the stairs. It +was a familiar step. He was sure he knew it. It must be a step he heard +daily. + +He stopped, and the step seemed to stop also. At that moment there was +a shuffling of slippered feet on an upper landing, and Jem-y-Lord called +down, “Is it you, your Honour?” + +With an effort he answered, “Yes.” + +“Is anything the matter?” called the man-servant. + +“There's somebody coming downstairs, isn't there?” said Philip. + +“Somebody coming downstairs?” repeated the man-servant, and the light +shifted as if he were lifting the lamp. + +“Is it you coming down, Jem?” + +“Me coming down? I'm here, holding the lamp, your Honour.” + +“Another of my fancies,” thought Philip; and he laid hold of the +handrail, and started afresh. The step came on. He knew it now; it was +his own step. “An echo,” he told himself. “A dream,” he thought, “a +mirage of the mind;” and he compelled himself to go up. The step came +down. It passed him on the stairs, going by the wall as he went by the +rail, with an irresistible down-drive, headlong, heavily. + +Then came one of those moments of partial unconsciousness in which the +sensation of a sound takes shape. It seemed to Philip that the figure of +a man had passed him. He remembered it instantly. It was the same that +he had seen in the lobby to the Council Chamber, his own figure, but +wrapped in a cloak like the one he was then wearing, and with the hood +drawn over the head. The body had been half turned aside, the face had +been hidden, and the whole form had expressed contempt, repugnance, and +loathing. + +“Not well to-night, your Honour?” said the far-off voice of Jem-y-Lord. +He was holding the dazzling lamp up to the Deemster's face. + +“A little faint--that's all. Go to bed.” + +Then Philip was alone in his room. “Conscience!” he thought. “Pete may +go, but _this_ will be with me to the end. Which, O God?--which?” + +He poured out half a tumbler from the bottle on the table, and gulped it +down at a draught. At the same moment he heard a light foot overhead. It +was a woman's foot; it crossed the floor, and then ceased. + + + + +IX. + +Next morning the Deemster was still sleeping while the sun was shining +into his room. He was awakened by a thunderous clamour, which came +as from a nail driven into the back of his head. Opening his eyes, +he realised that somebody was knocking at his door, and shouting in a +robustious bass-- + +“Christian, I say! Ever going to get up at all?” + +It was the Clerk of the Rolls. Under one of his heavy poundings the +catch of the door gave way, and he stepped into the room. + +“Degenerate Manxman!” he roared. “In bed on Tynwald morning. Pooh! this +room smells of dead sleep, dead spirits, and dead everything. Let me get +at that window--you pitch your clothes all over the floor. Ah! that's +fresher! Headache? I should think so. Get up, then, and I'll drive you +to St. John's.” + +“Don't think I'll go to-day, sir,” said Philip in a feeble whimper. + +“Not go? Holy saints! Judge of his island and not go to Tynwald! What +will the Governor say?” + +“He said last night he would excuse my absence.” + +“Excuse your fiddlesticks! The air will do you good. I've got the +carriage below. Listen! it's striking ten by the church. I'll give you +fifteen minutes, and step into your breakfast-room and look over the +_Times_.” + +The Clerk rolled out, and then Philip heard his loud voice through the +door in conversation with Jem-y-Lord. + +“And how's Mrs. Cottier to-day?” + +“Middling, sir, thank you, sir.'' + +“You don't let us see too much of her, Jemmy.” + +“Not been well since coming to Douglas, sir.” + +Cups and saucers rattled, the newspaper creaked, the Clerk cleared his +throat, and there was silence. + +Philip rose with a heavy heart, still in the torment of his great +temptation. He remembered the vision of the night before, and, broad +morning as it was, he trembled. In the Isle of Man such visions are +understood to foretell death, and the man who sees them is said to “see +his soul.” But Philip had no superstitions. He knew what the vision was: +he knew what the vision meant. + +Jem-y-Lord came in with hot water, and Philip, without looking round, +said in a low tone as the door closed, “How now, my lad?” + +“Fretting again, your Honour,” said the man, in a half whisper. He +busied himself in the room a moment, and then added, “Somehow she gets +to know things. Yesterday evening now--I was taking down some of the +bottles, and I met her on the stairs. Next time I saw her she was +crying.” + +Philip said in a confused way, fumbling the razor. “Tell her I intend to +see her after Tynwald.” + +“I have, your Honour. 'It's not that, Mr. Cottier,' she answered me.” + +“My wig and gown to-day, Jemmy,” said Philip, and he went out in his +robes as Deemster. + +The day was bright, and the streets were thronged with vehicles. Brakes, +wagonettes, omnibuses, private carriages, and cadger's carts all loaded +to their utmost, were climbing out of Douglas by way of the road to +Peel. The town seemed to shout; the old island rock itself seemed to +laugh. + +“Bless me, Christian,” said the Clerk of the Rolls, looking at his +watch, “do you know it's half-past ten? Service begins at eleven. Drive +on, coachman. You've eight miles to do in half an hour.” + +“Can't go any faster with this traffic on the road, sir,” said the +coachman over his shoulder. + +“I got so absorbed in the newspaper,” said the Clerk, “that---- Well, if +we're late, we're late, that's all.” + +Philip folded his arms across his breast and hung his head. He was +fighting a great battle. + +“No idea that the fisherman affair was going to be so serious,” said +the Clerk. “It seems the Governor has ordered out every soldier and +pensioner. If I know my countrymen, they'll not stand much of that.” + +Philip drew a long breath: there was a cloud of dust; the women in the +brakes were laughing. + +“I hear a whisper that the ringleader is a friend of yours, +Christian--'an irregular relative of a high official,' as the reporter +says.” + +“He is my cousin, sir,” said Philip. + +“What? The big, curly-pated fellow you took home in the carriage?... I +say, coachman, no need to drive _quite_ so fast.” + +Philip's head was still down. The Clerk of the Rolls sat watching him +with an anxious face. + +“Christian, I am not so sure the Governor wasn't right after all. Is +this what's been troubling you for a month? You're the deuce for a +secret. If there's anything good to tell, you're up like the sun; but if +there's bad news going, an owl is a poll-parrot compared with you for +talking.” + +Philip made some feeble effort to laugh, and to say his head was still +aching. They were on the breast of the steep hill going up to Greeba. +The road ahead was like a funnel of dust; the road behind was like the +tail of a comet. + +“Pity a fine lad like that should get into trouble,” said the Clerk. +“I like the rascal. He got round an old man's heart like a rope round +a capstan. One of the big, hearty dogs that make you say, 'By Jove, +and I'm a Manxman, too.' He's in the right in this affair, whatever the +Governor may say. And the Governor knows it, Christian--that's why +he's so anxious to excuse you. He can overawe the Keys; and as for the +Council, we're paid our wages, God bless us, and are so many stuffed +snipes on his stick. But you--you're different. Then the man is your +kinsman, and blood is thicker than water, if it's only---- Why, what's +this?” + +There was some whooping behind; the line of carriages swirled like a +long serpent half a yard near the hedge, and through the grey dust a +large covered car shot by at the gallop of a fire-engine. The Clerk-sat +bolt upright. + +“Now, what in the name of----” + +“It's an ambulance waggon,” said Philip between his set teeth. + +A moment later a second waggon went galloping past, then a third, and +finally a fourth. + +“Well, upon my---- Ah! good day. Doctor! Good day, good day!” + +The Clerk had recognised friends on the waggons, and was returning their +salutations. When they were gone, he first looked at Philip, and then +shouted, “Coachman, right about face. We're going home again--and chance +it.” + +“We can't be turning here, sir,” said the coachman. “The vehicles +are coming up like bees going a-swarming. We'll have to go as far as +Tynwald, anyway.” + +“Go on,” said Philip in a determined voice. + +After a while the Clerk said, “Christian, it isn't worth while getting +into trouble over this affair. After all, the Governor is the Governor. +Besides, he's been a good friend to you.” + +Philip was passing through a purgatorial fire, and his old master was +feeding it with fuel on every side. They were nearing Tynwald, and could +see the flags, the tents, and the crowd as of a vast encampment, and +hear the deep hum of a multitude, like the murmur of a distant sea. + + + + +X. + +Tynwald Hill is the ancient Parliament ground of Man. It is an open +green in the midst of the island, with hills on three of its sides, and +on the fourth a broad plain dipping to the coast. This green is of +the shape of a guitar. Down the middle of the guitar there is a walled +enclosure of the shape of a banjo. At the end stands a church. The round +drum is the mount, which has four circles, the topmost being some six +paces across. + +The carriage containing the Deemster and the Clerk of the Bolls had +drawn up at the west gate of the church, and a policeman had opened the +door. There came the sound of singing from the porch. + +“A quarter late,” said the Clerk of the Rolls, consulting his watch. +“Shall we go in, your Honor?” + +“Let us take a turn round the fair instead,” said Philip. + +The carriage door was shut back, and they began to move over the green. +The open part of it was covered with booths, barrows, stands, and +show-tents. There were cheap jacks with shoddy watches, phrenologists +with two chairs, fat women, dwarfs, wandering minstrels, itinerant +hawkers of toffee in tin hat-boxes, and other shiny and slimy creatures +with the air and grease of the towns. There were a few oxen and horses +also, tethered and lanketted, and kicking up the dust under the dry +turf. + +The crowd was dense already, and increasing at every moment. As the +brakes arrived, they drove up with a swing that sent the people surging +on either side. Some brought well-behaved visitors, others brought an +eruption of ruffians. + +Down the neck of the enclosure, and round the circular end of it, stood +a regiment of soldiers with rifles and bayonets. The steps to the mount +were laid down with rushes. Two armchairs were on the top, under a +canopy hung from a flagstaff that stood in the centre. These chairs were +still empty, and the mount and its approaches were kept clear. + +The sun was overhead, the heat was great, the odour was oppressive. Now +and again the sound of the service within the church mingled with the +crack of the toy rifle-ranges and the jabber of the cheap jacks. At +length there was another sound--a more portentous sound--the sound of +bands playing in the distance. It came from both south and west, from +the direction of Peel, and from that of Port St. Mary. + +“They're coming,” said the Clerk, and Philip's face, when he turned his +head to listen, quivered and grew yet more pale. + +As the bands approached they ceased to play. Presently a vast procession +of men from the west came up in silence to the skirt of the hill, and +turned off in the direction from which the men from the south were seen +to be coming. They were in jerseys and sea-boots, marching four deep, +and carrying nothing in their brawny hands. One stalwart fellow walked +firmly at the head of them.. It was Pete. + +Philip could support the strain no longer. He got out of the carriage. +The Clerk of the Rolls got out also, and followed him as he walked with +wavering, irregular steps. + +Under a great tree at the junction of three roads, the two companies +of fishermen met and fell into a general throng. There was a low wall +around the tree-trunk, and, standing on this, Pete's head was clear +above the rest. + +“Boys,” he was saying, “there's three hundred armed soldiers on the hill +yonder, with twenty rounds of ball-cartridge apiece. You're going to the +Coort because you've a right to go. You're going up peaceable, and, when +you're getting there, you're going to mix among the soldiers, three to +every man, two on either side and one behind. Then your spokesmen +are going to spake out your complaint. If they're listened to, you're +wanting no better. But if they're not, and if the word is given to fire +on them, then, before there's time to do it, you're going to stretch +every man of the three hundred on his back and take his weapon. Don't +hurt the soldiers--the poor soldiers are only doing what they're tould. +But don't let the soldiers hurt you neither. You're going there for +justice. You're not going there to fight. But if anybody fights you, let +him never forget the day he done it. Break up every taffy stand in the +fair, if you can't find anything better. And if blood is shed, lave +the man that orders it to me. And now go up, boys, like men and like +Manxmen.” + +There was no cheering, no shouting, no clapping of hands. Only broken +exclamations and a sort of confused murmur. “Come,” whispered the Clerk +of the Rolls, putting his hand through Philip's quivering arm. “Little +does the poor devil think that, if blood is shed, he will be the first +to fall.” “God in heaven!” muttered Philip. + + + + +XI. + +The crowd on Tynwald had now gathered thick down the neck of the +enclosure and dense round the mount. To the strains of the National +Anthem, played by the band of the regiment, the Governor had come out of +the church. He was in cocked hat and with sword, and the sword of state +was carried upright before him. With his Keys, Council, and clergy, he +walked to the hill-top. There he took one of the two chairs under the +canopy; the other, was taken by the Bishop in his lawn. Their followers +came behind, and broke up on the hill into an indiscriminate mass. A +number of ladies were admitted to the space on the topmost round. They +stood behind the chairs, with their parasols still open. + +There are men that the densest crowd will part and make way for. +The crowd had parted and made way for Philip. As the court was being +“fenced,” he appeared with his companion at the foot of the mount. There +he was recognised by many, but he scarcely answered their salutations. +The Governor made a deferential bow, smiled, and beckoned to him to come +up to his side. He went up slowly, pausing at every other step, like a +man who was in doubt if he ought to go higher. At length he stood at the +Governor's right hand, with all eyes upon him, for the favourite of +the great is favoured. He was then the highest figure on the mount, the +Governor and the Bishop being seated. The people could see him from +end to side of the Tynwald, and he could see the people as they stood +closely packed on the green below. + +The business of the Court began. It was that of promulgating the laws. +Philip's senior colleague, the old Deemster of the happy face, read the +titles of the laws in English. + +Then the Coroner of the premier sheading began to recite the same titles +in Manx. Nobody heard them; hardly anybody listened. The ladies on the +mount chatted among themselves, the Keys and the clergy intermingled and +talked, the officials of the Council looked at the crowd, and the crowd +itself, having nothing to hear, no more to see, indifferent to +doings they could not understand, resumed their amusements among the +frivolities of the fair. + +There were three persons in that assembly of fifteen thousand who were +following the course of events with feverish interest. The first of +these was the Governor, whose restless eyes were rolling from side +to side with almost savage light; the second was the captain of the +regiment, who was watching the Governor's face for a signal; the third +was Philip, who was looking down at the crowd and seeing something that +had meaning for himself alone. + +The fishermen came up quietly, three thousand strong. Half a hundred of +them lounged around the magazine--the ammunition was at their command. +The rest pushed, edged, and elbowed their way through the people until +they came to the line of the guard. Wherever there was a red coat, +behind it there were three jerseys and stocking-caps, Philip saw it all +from his elevation on the mount. His face was deadly pale, his eyelids +wavered, his lower lip trembled, his hand twitched; when he was spoken +to, he hardly answered; he was like a man holding counsel with himself, +and half in fear that everybody could read his hidden thoughts. He was +in the last throes of his temptation. The decisive moment was near. It +was heavy with the fate of his after life. He thought of Pete and +the torture of his company; of Kate and the unending misery of her +existence; of himself and the deep duplicity to which he was committed. +From all this he could be freed for ever--by what? By doing nothing, +having already done his duty? Only let him command himself, and +then--relief from an existence enthralled by torment--from constant +alarm and watchfulness--peace--sleep--love--Kate! + +Somebody was speaking to him over his shoulder. It was nothing--only +the quip of a witty fellow, descendant of a Spanish freebooter. Ladies +caught his eye, smiled and bowed to him. A little man, whose swarthy +face showed African blood, reached up and quoted something about the +bounds of freedom wide and wider. + +The Coroner had finished, the proceedings were at an end--there was a +movement--something had happened--the Governor had half risen from his +chair. Twelve men in sea-boots and blue jerseys had passed the line of +the guard, and were standing midway across the steps of the mount. One +of them was beginning to speak. It was Pete. + +“Governor,” he said; but the captain of the regiment was abreast of him +in a moment, and a score of the soldiers were about his companions at +the next breath. The fishermen stood their ground like a wall, and the +soldiers fell back. There was hardly any scuffle. + +“Governor,” said Pete again, touching his cap. + +The Governor was twisting in his seat. Looking first at Pete, and then +at the captain, he was in the act of lifting his hand when suddenly it +was held by another hand at his side, and a low voice whispered at his +ear, “No, sir; for God's sake, no!” + +It was Philip. The Governor looked at him with amazement. “What do you +mean?” + +“I mean,” said Philip, still whispering over him hotly and impetuously, +“that there's only one way back to Government House, but if you lift +your hand it will be one too many; I mean that if blood is shed you'll +never live to leave this mount; I mean that your three hundred soldiers +are only as three hundred rabbits in the claws of three thousand crows.” + +At the next instant he had left the Governor, and was face to face with +the fishermen. + +“Fishermen,” he cried, lifting both hands before him, “let there be no +trouble here to-day, no riot, for God's sake, no bloodshed. Listen to +me. I am the grandson of a fisherman; I have been a fisherman myself; I +love the fishermen. As long as I live I will stand by you. Your rights +shall be my rights, your sins my sins, and where you go I will go too.” + +Then, swinging back to the Governor, he bowed low, and said in a +deferential voice-- + +“Your Excellency, these men mean no harm; they wish to speak to you; +they have a petition to make; they will be loyal and peaceable.” + +But the Governor, having recovered from his first fear, was now in a +flame of anger. + +“No,” he said, with the accent of authority; “this is no time and no +place for petitions.” + +“Forgive me, your Excellency,” said Philip, with a deeper bow; “this is +the time of all times, the place of all places.” + +There had been a general surging of the Keys and clergy towards the +steps, and now one of them cried out of their group, “Is Tynwald Court +to be turned into a bear-garden?” And another said in a cynical voice, +“Perhaps your Excellency has taken somebody else's seat.” + +Philip raised himself to his full height, and answered, with his eyes on +the speakers, “We are free-born men on this island, your Excellency. We +did not come to Tynwald to learn order from the grandson of a Spanish +pirate, or freedom from the son of a black chief.” + +“Hould hard, boys!” cried Pete, lifting one hand against his followers, +as if to keep them quiet. He was boiling with a desire to shout till his +throat should crack. + +The Governor had exchanged rapid looks and low whispers with the +captain. He saw that he was outwitted, that he was helpless, that he was +even in personal danger. The captain was biting his leg with vexation +that he had not reckoned more seriously with this rising--that he had +not drawn up his men in column. + +“Your Excellency will hear the fishermen?” said Philip. + +“No, no, no,” said the Governor. He was at least a brave man, if a vain +and foolish one. + +There was silence for a moment. Then, standing erect, and making an +effort to control himself, Philip said, “May it please your Excellency, +you fill a proud position here; you are the ruler of this island under +your sovereign lady our Queen. But we, your subjects, your servants, are +in a prouder position still. We are Manxmen. This is the Court of our +country.” + +“Hould hard,” cried Pete again. + +“For a thousand years men with our blood and our names have stood on +this hill to hear the voice of the people, and to do justice between +man and man. That's what the place was meant for. If it has lost that +meaning, root it up--it is a show and a sham.” + +“Bravo!” cried Pete; he could hold himself in no longer, and his word +was taken up with a shout, both on the hill and on the green beneath. + +Philip's voice had risen to a shrill cry, but it was low and meek as he +added, bowing yet lower while he spoke-- + +“Your Excellency will hear the fishermen?” + +The Governor rolled in his seat. “Go on,” he said impatiently. + +The men made their petition. Three or four of them spoke briefly and +to the point. They had had harbours, their fathers' harbours, which had +been freed to them forty years before; don't ask them to pay harbour +dues until proper harbours were provided: + +The Governor gave his promise. Then he rose, the band struck up “God +save the Queen,” and the Legislature filed back to the chapel. + +Philip went with them. He had fought a great battle, and he had +prevailed. Through purging fires the real man had emerged, but he +had paid the price of his victory. His eye burned like live coal, +his cheek-bones seemed to have upheaved. He walked alone; his ancient +colleague had stepped ahead of him. But now and again, as he passed down +the long path to the church-door, fishermen and farmers pushed between +the rifles of the guards, and said in husky voices, “Let me shake you by +the hand, Dempster.” + +The scene was repeated with added emotion half an hour afterwards, when, +the court being adjourned and the Governor gone in ominous silence, +Philip came out, white and smiling, and leaning on the arm of his old +master, the Clerk of the Rolls. He could scarcely tear himself through +the thick-set hedge of people that lined the path to the gate. As he +got into the carriage his smile disappeared. Sinking into the seat, he +buried himself in the corner and dropped his head on his breast. The +people began to cheer. + +“Drive on,” he cried. + +The cheering became loud. + +“Drive, drive,” he cried. + +The people cheered yet louder. They thought that they had seen a grand +triumph that day--a man triumphing over the Governor. But there had +been a grander triumph which they had not seen--a man triumphing over +himself. Only one saw that, and it was God. + + + + +XII. + +Pete seemed to be beside himself. He laughed until he cried; he cried +until he laughed. His resonant voice rang out everywhere. + +“Hear him? My gough, it was like a bugle spaking. There's nobody can +spake but himself. When the others are toot-tooting, it's just 'Polly, +put the kettle on' (mimicking a mincing treble). See the lil Puffin on +his throne of turf there? Looked as if Ould Nick had been thrashing peas +on his face for a week.” + +Pete's enthusiasm rose to frenzy, and he began to sweep through the +fair, bemoaning his country and pouring mouth-fuls of anathema on his +countrymen. + +“_Mannin veg villish_ (sweet little Isle of Man), with your English +Governors and your English Bishops, and boys of your own worth ten of +them. _Manninee graihagh_ (beloved Manxmen), you're driving them away to +be Bishops for others and Governors abroad--and yourselves going to the +dogs and the divil, and d------ you.” + +Pete's prophetic mood dropped to a jovial one. He bought the remaining +stock-in-trade of an itinerant toffee-seller, and hammered the lid of +the tin hat-box to beat up the children. They followed him like hares +hopping in the snow; and he distributed his bounty in inverse relation +to size, a short stick to a big lad, a long stick to a little one, and +two sticks to a girl. The results were an infantile war. Here, a damsel +of ten squaring her lists to fight a hulking fellow of twelve for her +sister of six; and there, a mother wiping the eyes of her boy of five, +and whispering “Hush, bogh; hush! You shall have the bladder when we +kill the pig.” + +Pete began to drink. “How do, Faddy? Taking joy of you, Juan. Are you in +life, Thom! Half a glass of rum will do no harm, boys. Not the drink at +all--just the good company, you know.” + +He hailed the women also, but they were less willing to be treated. “I'd +have more respect for my quarterly ticket, sir,” said Betsy--she was a +Primitive, with her husband on the “Planbeg.” “There's a hole in your +pocket, Capt'n; stop it up with your fist, man,” said Liza--she was a +gombeen woman, and when she got a penny in her hand it was a prisoner +for life. “Chut! woman,” said Pete, “what's the good book say ing? +'Riches have wings;' let the birds fly then,” and off he went, reeling +and tottering, and laughing his formidable laugh. + +Pete grew merry. Rooting up the remains of the fishermen's band, he +hired them to accompany him through the fair. They were three little +musicians, now exceedingly drunk, and their duty was to play “Hail, Isle +of Man,” as he went swaggering along in front of them. + + “Hail, Isle of Man, + Swate ocean lan', + I love thy sea-girt border.” + +“Play up, Jackie.” + + “The barley sown, + Potatoes down, + We'll get our boats in order.” + +Thus he forged through the fair, capering, laughing, shouting protests +over his shoulder when the tipsy music failed, pretending to be very +drunk, trying to show that he was carrying on, that he was going it, +that he hadn't a second thought, but watching everything for all that, +studying every face, and listening to the talk of everybody. + +“Whips of money at him, Liza--whips of it--millions, they're +saying.”--“He's spending it like flitters then. The Manx chaps isn't fit +for fortunes--no, they aren't. I wonder in the world what sort of wife +there's at him. _I_ don't 'low my husband the purse. Three ha'pence is +enough to be giving any man at once.”--“Wife, you're saying? Don't you +know, woman?” Then some whispering. + +“Bass, boy--more bass, I tell thee.” + + “We then sought nex' + The soothing sex, + Our swatearts at Port Erin.” + +“Who _is_ the man at all?”--“Why, Capt'n Quilliam from +Kimberley.”--“'Deed, man! Him that married with some of the Cæsar +Glenmooar's ones?”--“She's left him, though, and gone off with a +wastrel.”--“You don't say?”--“Well, I saw the young woman myself----” + + “At Quiggin's Hall + There's enough for all, + Good beer, and all things proper.” + +“Hould,boys!” + +Pete had drawn up suddenly, and stopped his musicians with a sweep of +the arm. + +“Were you spaking, Mr. Corteen?” + +“Nothing, Capt'n. No need to stare at all. I was only saying I was at +the camp-meeting at Sulby, and I saw----” + +“Go on, Jackie.” + + “A pleasant place, + With beds of aise, + When we are done our supper.” + +The unhappy man was deceiving himself at least as much as anybody else. +After looking for the light of intelligence in every face, waiting for +a word, watching for a glance, expecting every moment that some one +from south or north, or east or west, would say, “I've seen her;” yet, +covering up the burning coal of his anxiety with the ashes of mock +merriment, he tried to persuade himself that Kate was not on the +island if nobody at Tynwald had seen her; that he had told the truth +unwittingly, and that he was as happy as the day was long. + + + + +XIII. + +A man in a gig came driving a long-horned cow in front of him. Driver, +horse, gig, and cow were like animated shapes of dust, but Pete +recognised them. + +“Is it yourself, Cæsar? So you're for selling ould Horney?” + +“Grieved in my heart I am to do it, sir. Many a good glass of milk she +has given to me and mine,” and Cæsar was ready to weep. + +“Going falling in fits, isn't she, Cæsar?” + +“Hush, man! hush, man!” said Cæsar, looking about. “A good cow, very; +but down twice since I left home this morning.” + +“I'd give a bad sixpence to see Cæsar selling that cow,” thought Pete. + +Three men were bargaining over a horse. Two were selling, the third (it +was Black Tom) was buying. + +“Rising five years, sir. Sired by Mahomet. Oh, I've got the papers to +prove it,” said one of the two. + +“What, man? Five?” shouted Black Tom down the horse's open mouth. +“She'll never see eight the longest day she lives.” + +“No use decaiving the man,” said the other dealer, speaking in Manx. +“She's sixteen--'low she's nine, anyway.” + +“Fair play, boys; spake English before a poor fellow,” said Black Tom, +with a snort. + +“This brother of mine lows she's seven,” said the first of the two. + +“You thundering liar,” said Black Tom in Manx. “He says she's sixteen.” + +“Dealing ponies then?” asked Pete. + +“Anything, sir; anything. Buying for farmers up Lonan way,” said Black +Tom. + +“Come on,” said Pete; “here's Cæsar with a long-horned cow.” + +They found the good man tethering a white, long-horned cow to the wheel +of the tipped-up gig. + +“How do, Cæsar? And how much for the long-horn?” said Black Tom. + +“Aw, look at the base (beast), Mr. Quilliam. Examine her for yourself,” + said Cæsar. + +“Middling fair ewer, good quarter, five calves--is it five, Cæsar?” said +Black Tom, holding one of the long horns. + +“Three, sir, and calving again for February.” + +“No milk fever? No? Kicks a bit at milking? Never? Fits? Ever had fits, +Cæsar?” opening wide one of the cow's eyes. + +“Have you known me these years for a dacent man, Mr. Quilliam----” began +Cæsar in an injured tone. + +“Well, what's the figure?” + +“Fourteen pound, sir! and she'll take the road before I'll go home with +a pound less!” + +“Fourteen--what! Ten; I'll give you ten--not a penny more.” + +“Good day to _you_, Mr. Quilliam,” said Cæsar. Then, as if by an +afterthought, “You're an ould friend of mine, Thomas; a very ould +friend, Tom--I'll split you the diff'rance.” + +“Break a straw on it,” said Black Tom; and the transaction was complete. + +“I've had a clane strike here--the base is worth fifteen,” chuckled +Black Tom in Pete's ear as he drove the cow in to a shed beyond. + +“I must be buying another cow in place of poor ould Horney,” whispered +Cæsar as he dived into the cattle stand. + +“Strike up, Jackie,” shouted Pete. + + “West of the mine, + The day being fine. + The tide against us veering.” + +Ten minutes later Pete heard a fearful clamour, which drowned the noise +that he himself was making. Within the shed the confusion of tongues was +terrific. + +“What's this at all?” he asked, crushing through with an innocent face. + +“The man's cow has fits,” cried Black Tom. “I'll have my money back. +The ould psalm-singing Tommy Noddy! did he think he was lifting the +collection? My money! My twelve goolden pounds!” + +If Black Tom had not been as bald as a bladder, he would have torn his +hair in his mortification. But Pete pacified him. + +“Cæsar is looking for another cow--sell him his own back again. +Impozz'ble? Who says it's impozz'ble? Cut off her long horns, and he'll +never be knowing her from her grandmother.” + +Then Pete made up to Cæsar and said, “Tom's got a mailie (hornless) cow +to sell, and it's the very thing you're wanting.” + +“Is she a good mailie?” asked Cæsar. + +“Ten quarts either end of the day, Cæsar, and fifteen pounds of butter a +week,” said Pete. + +“Where's the base, sir?” said Cæsar. + +They met Black Tom leading a hornless, white cow from the shed to the +green. + +“Are you coming together, Peter?” he said cheerfully. + +Cæsar eyed the cow doubtfully for a moment, and then said briskly, +“What's the price of the mailie, Mr. Quilliam?” + +“Aw, look at the base first, Mr. Cregeen. Examine her for yourself, +sir.” + +“Yes--yes--well, yes; a middling good base enough. Four calves, Thomas?” + +“Two, sir, and calves again for January. Twenty-four quarts of new milk +every day of life, and butter fit to burst the churn for you.” + +“No fever at all? No fits? No?” + +“Aw, have you known me these teens of years, Mr. Cregeen----” + +“Well, what d'ye say--eleven pounds for the cow, Tom!” + +“Thirteen, Cæsar; and if you warn an ould friend----” + +“Hould your hand, Mr. Quilliam; I'm not a man when I've got a +bargain.... Manx notes or the dust, Thomas? Goold? Here you are, +then--one--two--three--four...” (giving the cow another searching glance +across his shoulder). “It's wonderful, though, the straight she's +like ould Horney... five--six--seven... in colour and size, I +mane... eight--nine--ten... and if she warn a mailie cow, now... +eleven--twelve--” (the money hanging from his thumb). “Will that be +enough, Mr. Quilliam? No? Half a one, then? Aw, you're hard, Tom... +thirteen.” + +Having paid the last pound, Cæsar stood a moment contemplating his +purchase, and then said doubtfully, “Well, if I hadn't... Grannie will +be saying it's the same base back-----” (the cow began to reel). “Yes, +and it--no, surely--a mailie for all-----” (the cow fell). “It's got the +same fits, anyway,” cried Cæsar; and then he rushed to the cow's head. +“It _is_ the same base. The horns are going cutting off at her. My money +back! Give me my money back--my thirteen yellow sovereigns--the sweat of +my brow!” he cried. + +“Aw, no,” said Black Tom. “There's no money giving back at all. If the +cow was good enough for you to sell, she's good enough for you to buy,” + and he turned on his heel with a laugh of triumph. + +Cæsar was choking with vexation. + +“Never mind, sir,” said Pete. “If Tom has taken a mane advantage of +you, it'll be all set right at the Judgment. You've that satisfaction, +anyway.” + +“Have I? No, I haven't,” said Cæsar from between his teeth. “The man's +clever. He'll get himself converted before he comes to die, and then +there'll not be a word about cutting the horns off my cow.” + +“Strike up, Jackie,” shouted Pete. + + “Hail, Isle of Man, + Swate ocean làn', + I love thy sea-girt border.” + + + + +XIV. + +The sky became overcast, rain began to fall, and there was a rush for +the carts. In half an hour Tynwald Hill was empty, and the people were +splashing off on every side like the big drops of rain that were pelting +down. + +Pete hired a brake that was going back to the north, and gathered up +his friends from Ramsey. When these were seated, there was a rush of +helpless and abandoned ones who were going in the same direction--young +mothers with children, old men and old women. Pete hauled them up till +the seats and the floor were choked, and the brake could hold no more. +He got small thanks. “Such crushing and scrooging! I declare my black +merino frock, that I've only had on once, will be teetotal spoilt.”--“If +they don't start soon I'll be taking the neuralgy dreadful.” + +They got started at length, and, at the tail of a line of stiff carts, +they went rattling over the mountain-road. The harebells nodded their +washed faces from the hedge, and the talk was brisk and cheerful. + +“Our Thorn's sowl a hafer, and got a good price.”--“What for didn't you +buy the mare of Corlett Beldroma, Juan?”--“Did I want to be killed as +dead as a herring?”--“Kicks, does she? Bate her, man; bate her. A horse +is like a woman. If you aren't bating her now and then----” + +They stopped at every half-way houses--it was always halfway to +somewhere. The men got exceedingly drunk and began to sing. At that the +women grew very angry. + +“Sakes alive! you're no better than a lot of Cottonies.”--“Deed, but +they're worse than any Cottonies, ma'am. Some excuse for the like of +_them_. In their cotton-mills all the year, and nothing at home but a +piece of grass the size of your hand in the backyard, and going hopping +on it like a lark in a cage.” + +The rain came down in torrents, the mountain-path grew steep and +desolate, the few houses passed were empty and boarded up, gorse bushes +hissed to the rising breeze, geese scuttled and screamed across the +untilled land, a solitary black crow flew across the leaden sky, and on +the sea outside a tall pillar of smoke went stalking on and on, where +the pleasure-steamer carried her freight of tourists round the island. +Then songs gave way to sighs, some of the men began to pick quarrels, +and some to break into fits of drunken sobbing. + +Pete kept them all up. He chaffed and laughed and told funny stories. +Choking, stifling, wounded to the heart as he was, still he was carrying +on, struggling to convince everybody and himself as well, that nothing +was amiss, that he was a jolly fellow, and had not a second thought. + +He was glad to get home, nevertheless, where he need play the hypocrite +no longer. Going through Sulby, he dropped out of the brake and looked +in at the “Fairy.” The house was shut. Grannie was sitting up for Cæsar, +and listening for the sound of wheels. There was something unusual and +mysterious about her. Cruddled over the fire, she was smoking, a long +clay in little puffs of blue smoke that could barely be seen. The sweet +old soul in her troubles had taken to the pipe as a comforter. Pete +could see that something had happened since morning, but she looked at +him with damp eyes, and he was afraid to ask questions. He began to talk +of the great doings of the day at Tynwald, then of Philip, and finally +of Kate, apologising a little wildly for the mother not coming home +sooner to the child, but protesting that she had sent the little one no +end of presents. + +“Presents, bless ye,” he began rapturously---- + +“You don't ate enough, Pete, 'deed you don't,” said Grannie. + +“Ate? Did you say ate?” cried Pete. “If you'd seen me at the fair you'd +have said, 'That man's got the inside of a limekiln!' Aw, no, Grannie, +I'm not letting my jaws travel far. When I've got anything before me +it's--down--same as an ostrich.” + +Going away in the darkness, he heard Cæsar creaking up in the gig with +old Horney, now old Mailie, diving along in front of him. + +Nancy was waiting for Pete at Elm Cottage. She tried to bustle him +upstairs. + +“Come, man, come,” she said; “get yourself off to bed and I'll bring +your clothes down to the fire.” + +He had never slept in the bedroom since Kate had left. “Chut! I've lost +the habit of beds,” he answered. “Always used of the gable loft, you +know, and the wind above the thatch.” + +Not to be thought to behave otherwise than usual, he went upstairs that +night. But-- + + “Feather beds are saft, + Pentit rooms are bonnie, + But ae kiss o' my dear love + Better's far than ony.” + +The rain was still falling, the sea was loud, the mighty breath of night +was shaking the walls of the house and rioting through the town. He was +wet and tired, longing for a dry skin and a warm bed and rest. + + “Yet fain wad I rise and rin + If I tho't I would meet my dearie.” + +The long-strained rapture of faith and confidence was breaking down. He +saw it breaking. He could deceive himself no more. She was gone, she was +lost, she would lie on his breast no more. + +“God help me! O, Lord, help me,” he cried in his crushed and breaking +heart. + + + + +XV. + +When Kate thought of her husband after she had left him, it was not with +any crushing sense of shame. She had injured him, but she had gained +nothing by it. On the contrary, she had suffered, she had undergone +separation from her child. To soften the hard blow inflicted, she had +outraged the tenderest feelings of her heart. As often as she thought of +Pete and the deep wrong she had done him, she remembered this sacrifice, +she wept over this separation. Thus she reconciled herself to her +conduct towards her husband. If she had bought happiness at the cost of +Pete's sufferings, her remorse might have been deep; but she had only +accepted shame and humiliation and the severance of the dearest of her +ties. + +When she had said in the rapture of passionate confidence that if she +possessed Philip's love there could be no humiliation and no shame, she +had not yet dreamt of the creeping degradation of a life in the dark, +under a false name, in a false connection: a life under the same roof +with Philip, yet not by his side, unacknowledged, unrecognised, hidden +and suppressed. Even at the moment of that avowal, somewhere in the +secret part of her heart, where lay her love of refinement and her +desire to be a lady, she had cherished the hope that Philip would find +a way out of the meanness of their relation, that she would come to live +openly beside him, she hardly knew how, and she did not care at what +cost of scandal, for with Philip as her own she would be proud and +happy. + +Philip had not found that way out, yet she did not blame him. She had +begun to see that the deepest shame of their relation was not hers but +his. Since she had lived in Philip's house the man in him had begun to +decay. She could not shut her eyes to this rapid demoralisation, and she +knew well that it was the consequence of her presence. The deceptions, +the subterfuges, the mean shifts forced upon him day by day, by every +chance, every accident, were plunging him in ever-deepening degradation. +And as she realised this a new fear possessed her, more bitter than any +humiliation, more crushing than any shame--the fear that he would cease +to love her, the terror that he would come to hate her, as he recognised +the depth to which she had dragged him down. + + + + +XVI. + +Back from Tynwald, Philip was standing in his room. From time to time +he walked to the window, which was half open, for the air was close and +heavy. A misty rain was falling from an empty sky, and the daylight +was beginning to fail. The tombstones below were wet, the treed were +dripping, the churchyard was desolate. In a corner under the wall lay +the angular wooden lid which is laid by a gravedigger over an open +grave. Presently the iron gates swung apart, and a funeral company +entered. It consisted of three persons and an uncovered deal coffin. One +of the three was the sexton of the church, another was the curate, the +third was a policeman. The sexton and the policeman carried the coffin +to the church-door, which the curate opened. He then went into the +church, and was followed by the other two. A moment later there were +three strokes of the church bell. Some minutes after that the funeral +company reappeared. It made for the open grave in the corner by the +wall. The cover was removed, the coffin was lowered, the policeman half +lifted his helmet, and the sexton put a careless hand to his cap. Then +the curate opened a book and closed it again. The burial service was +at an end. Half an hour longer the sexton worked alone in the drenching +rain, shovelling the earth back into the grave. + +“Some waif,” thought Philip; “some friendless, homeless, nameless waif.” + +He went noiselessly up the stairs to the floor above, slinking through +the house like a shadow. At a door above his own he knocked with a heavy +hand, and a woman's voice answered him from within-- + +“Is any one there?” + +“It is!,” he said. “I am coming to see you.” + +Then he opened the door and slipped into the room. It was a room like +his own at all points, only lower in the ceiling, and containing a bed. +A woman was standing with her back to the window, as if she had just +turned about from looking into the churchyard. It was Kate. She had been +expecting Philip, and waiting for him, but she seemed to be overwhelmed +with confusion. As he crossed the floor to go to her, he staggered, and +then she raised her eyes to his face. + +“You are ill,” she said. “Sit down. Shall I ring for the brandy?” + +“No,” he answered. “We have had a hard day at Tyn-wald--some +trouble--some excitement--I'm tired, that's all.” + +He sat on the end of the bed, and gazed out on the veil of rain, +slanting across the square church tower and the sky. + +“I was at Ramsey two days ago,” he said; “that's what I came to tell +you.” + +“Ah!” She linked her hands before her, and gazed out also. Then, in a +trembling voice, she asked, “Is mother well?” + +“Yes; I did not see her, but--yes, she bears up bravely.” + +“And--and--” the words stuck in her throat, “and Pete?” + +“Well, also--in health, at all events.” + +“You mean that he is broken-hearted?” + +With a deep breath he answered, “To listen to him you would think he was +cheerful enough.” + +“And little Katherine?” + +“She is well too. I did not see her awake. It was late, and she was in +her cradle. So rosy, and fresh, and beautiful!” + +“My sweet darling! She was clean too? They take care of her, don't +they?” + +“More care they could not take.” + +“My darling baby! Has she grown?” + +“Yes; they talk of taking her out of the long clothes soon. Nancy is +like a second mother to her.” + +Kate's foot was beating the floor. “Oh, why can't her own mother----” + she began, and then in a faltering voice, “but that cannot be, I +suppose.... Do her eyes change? Are they still blue? But she was asleep, +you say. My dear baby! Was it very late? Nine o'clock? Just nine? I was +thinking of her at that moment. It is true I am always thinking of her, +but I remember, because the clock was striking. 'She will be in her +little cot now,' I thought, 'bathed and clean, and so pretty in her +nightdress, the one with the frill!' My sweet, sweet angel!” + +Her speech was confused and broken. “Do you think if I never see her +until... Will I know her if... It's useless to think of that, though. +Is her hair like... What is the colour of her hair, Philip?” + +“Fair, quite fair; as fair as mine was----” + +She swirled round, came face to face with him, and cried, “Philip, +Philip, why can't I have my darling to myself? She would be well enough +here. I could keep her quiet. Oh, she would not disturb you. And I +should be so happy with my little Kate for company. The time is long +with me sometimes, Philip, and I could play with her all the day. And +then at night, when she would be in the cot, I could make her little +stock of clothes--her frocks and her little pinafores, and----” + +“Impossible, Kate, impossible!” said Philip. + +She turned to the window. “Yes,” she said, in a choking voice, “I +suppose it would even be stealing to fetch her away now. Only think! A +mother stealing her own child! O gracious heaven, have I sinned myself +so far from my innocent baby! My child, my child! My little Katherine!” + +Her bosom heaved, and she said in a hard tone, “I daresay they think I'm +a bad mother because I left her to others to nurse her and to love her, +to see her every day and all day, to bathe her sweet body, and to comb +her yellow hair, to look into her little blue eyes, and to watch all her +pretty, pretty ways--Oh, yes, yes.” she said, with increasing emotion, +“I daresay they think that of me.” + +“They think nothing but what is good of you, Kate--nothing but what is +good and kind.” + +She looked out on the rain which fell unceasingly, and said in a low +voice, “Is Pete still telling the same story--that I am only away for a +little while--that I am coming back?” + +“He is writing letters to himself now, and saying they come from you.” + +“From me?” + +“Such simple things--all in his own way--full of love and happiness--_I +am so happy and comfortable_--it is pitiful. He is like a child--he +never suspects anything. You are better and enjoying yourself and +looking forward to coming home soon. Sending kisses and presents for the +baby, too, and greetings for everybody. There are messages for me also. +_Your true and loving wife_--it is terrible.” + +She covered her face with both hands. “And is he telling everybody?” + +“Yes; that's what the letters are meant for. He thinks he is keeping +your name sweet and your place clean, so that you may return at any +time, and scandal may not touch you.” + +“Oh, why do you tell me that, Philip? It is dragging me back. And the +child is dragging me back also... Does he show the letters to you?” + +“Worse than that, Kate--much worse--he makes me answer them. I answered +one the other night. Oh, when I think of it! _Dear wife, glad to get +your welcome letters_. God knows how I held the pen--I was giddy enough +to drop it. He gave you all the news--about your father, and Grannie, +and everybody. All in his own bright way--poor old Pete, the +cheeriest, sunniest soul alive. _The Dempster is putting a sight on +us regular--trusts you are the better for leaving home_. It was +awful--awful! _Dearest Kirry, I'm missing you mortal--worse than +Kimberley. So come home soon, my true lil wife, to your foolish ould +husband, for his heart is losing him._” + +He leapt up, and began to tramp the floor. “But why do I tell you this? +I should bear my own burdens.” + +Her hands had come down from her face, which was full of a great +compassion. “And did _you_ have to write all that?” she asked. + +“Oh, he meant no harm. He had no thought of hurting anybody! He never +dreamt that every word was burning and blistering me to the heart of +hearts.” + +His voice deepened, and his face grew hard and ugly. “But it was the +same as if some devil out of hell had entered into the man and told him +how to torture me--as if the cruellest tyrant on earth had made me take +up the pen and write down my own death-warrant. I could have killed +him--I could not help it--yes, I felt at that moment as if---- Oh, what +am I saying?” + +He stopped, sat on the end of the bed again, and held his head between +his hands. + +She came and sat by his side. “Philip,” she said, “I am ruining you. +Yes, I am corrupting you. I who would have had you so high and pure--and +you so pure-minded--I am bringing you to ruin. Having me here is +destroying you, Philip. No one visits you now. You are shutting the +door on everybody.... I heard you come in last night, Philip. I hear you +every night. Yes, I know everything. Oh, you will end by hating me--I +know you will. Why don't you send me away? It will be better to send me +away in time, Philip. Besides, it will make no difference. We are in the +same house, yet we never meet. Send me away now, before it is too late.” + +He dropped his hand and felt for her hand; he was trying not to look +into her face. “We have both suffered, Kate. We can never hate one +another--we have suffered for each other's sake.” + +She clung tightly to the hand he gave her, and said, “Then you will +never forsake me, whatever happens?” + +“Never, Kate, never,” he answered; and with a smothered cry she threw +her arms about his neck. + +The rain continued to pour down on the roofs and on the tombs with a +monotonous plash. “But what is to be done?” she said. + +“God knows,” he answered. + +“What is to become of us, Philip? Are we never to smile on each other +again? We cannot carry a burden like this for ever. To-day, to-morrow, +the next day, the next year--is it to go on like this for a lifetime? Is +this life? Is there nothing that will end it?” + +“Yes, Kate, yes; there is one thing that will end it--one thing only.” + +“Do you mean--_death?_” + +He did not answer. She rose slowly from his side and returned to the +window, rested her forehead against the pane, and looked down on the +desolate churchyard and the sexton at his work in the rain. Suddenly she +broke the silence. “Philip,” she said, “I know now what we ought to do. +I wonder we have never thought of it before.” + +“What is it?” he asked. + +She was standing in front of him. Her breath came quickly. “Tell Pete +that I am dead.” + +“No, no, no.” + +She took both his hands. “Yes, yes,” she said. + +He kept his face away from her. “Kate, what are you saying?” + +“What is more natural, Philip? Only think--if you had been anybody else, +it would have come to that already. You must have hated me for dragging +you down into this mire of deceit, you must have forsaken me, and I must +have gone to wreck and ruin. Oh, I see it all--just as if it had really +happened. A solitary room somewhere--alone--sinking--dying--unknown, +unnamed--forgotten----” + +His eyes were wandering about the room. “It will kill him. If his heart +can break, it will break it,” he said. + +“He has lived after a heavier blow than that, Philip. Do you think he is +not suffering? For all his bright ways and hopeful talk and the letters +and the presents, do you think he is not suffering?” + +He liberated his hands, and began to tramp the room as before, but with +head down dud hands linked behind him. + +“It will be cruel to deceive him,” he said. + +“No, Philip, but kind. Death is not cruel. The wound it makes will heal. +It won't bleed for ever. Once he thinks I am dead he will weep a little +perhaps, and then “--she was stifling a sob--“then it will be all over. +'Poor girl,' he will say, 'she was much to blame. I loved her once, +and never did her any wrong. But she is gone, and she was the mother of +little Katherine--let us forget her faults'----” + +He had not heard her; he was standing before the window looking down. +“You are right, Kate, I think you must be right.” + +“I'm sure I am.” + +“He will suffer, but he will get over it.” + +“Yes, indeed. And you, Philip--he will torture you no longer. No more +letters, no more presents, no more messages----” + +“I'll do it--I'll do it to-morrow,” he said. + +She opened her arms wide, and cried, “Kiss me, Philip, kiss me. We shall +live again. Yes, we shall laugh together still--kiss me, kiss me.” + +“Not yet--when I come back.” + +“Very well--when you come back.” + +She sank into a chair, crying with joy, and he went out as he had +entered, noiselessly, stealthily, like a shadow. + +When a man who is not a criminal is given over to a deep duplicity of +life, he will clutch at any lie, wearing the mask of truth, which seems +to shield him from shame and pain. He may be a wise man in every other +relation, a shrewd man, a far-seeing and even a cunning man, but in this +relation--that of his own honour, his own fame, his own safety--he is +certain to be a blunderer, a bungler, and a fool. Such is the revenge of +Nature, such is God's own vengeance! + + + + +XVII. + +Philip was walking from Ballure House to Elm Cottage. It was late, +and the night was dark and silent--a muggy, dank, and stagnant night, +without wind or air, moon or stars. The road was quiet, the trees were +still, the sea made only a far-off murmur. + +And as he walked he struggled to persuade himself that in what he was +about to do he would be doing well. “It will not be wrong to deceive +him,” he thought. “It will only be for his own good. The suspense would +kill him. He would waste away. The sap of the man's soul would dry up. +Then why should I hesitate? Besides, it is partly true--true in its own +sense, and that is the real sense. She _is_ dead--dead to him. She can +never return to him; she is lost to him for ever. So it is true after +all--it is true.” + +“It is a lie,” said a voice at his ear. + +He started. He could have been sure that somebody had spoken. Yet there +was nobody by his side. He was alone in the road. “It must have been my +own voice,” he thought. “I must have been thinking aloud.” And then he +resumed his walk and his meditation. + +“And if it is a lie, is it therefore a crime?” he asked himself. “Sure +it is--how very sure!--it was a wise man that said so--a great fault +once committed is the first link in a chain. The other links seem to be +crimes also, but they are not--they are consequences. _Our_ fault was +long ago, and even then it was partly the fault of Fate. If the past +could be recalled we could not act differently unless our fates were +different. And what has followed has been only the consequence. It was +the consequence when Kate was married to Pete; it was the consequence +when she left him--and _this_ is the consequence.” + +“It is a lie,” said the same voice by his side. + +He stopped. The darkness was gross around him--he could see nothing. + +“Who's there?” he demanded. + +There was no answer. He stretched his hand out nervously. There was no +one at his side. “It must have been the wind in the trees,” he thought; +but there could be no wind in the stagnant dampness of that air. “It +was like my own voice,” he thought. Then he remembered how his man +in Douglas had told him that he had contracted a habit of talking to +himself of late. “It was my own voice,” he thought, and he went on +again. + +“A lie is a bad foundation to build on--that's certain. The thing that +should be cannot rest on the thing that is not. It will topple down; it +will come to ruin; it will wreck everything. Still----” + +“It is a lie,” said the voice again. There could be no mistaking it this +time. It was a low, deep whisper. It seemed to be spoken in the very +cavity of his ear. It was not his own voice, and yet it struck upon his +sense with the sound as of his own. It must be his own voice speaking to +himself! + +When this idea took hold of him, he was seized with a deadly shuddering. +His heart knocked against his ribs, and an icy coldness came over him. +“Only the same tormenting dream,” he thought. “Before it was a vision; +now it is a voice. It is generated by solitude and separation. I must +resist it I must be strong. It will drive me into an oppression as +of madness. Men do not 'see their souls' until they are bordering on +madness from religious mania or crime.” + +“A lie! a lie!” said the voice. + +“This is madness itself. To paint faces on the darkness, to hear voices +in the air, is madness. The madman can do no more.” + +“A lie!” said the voice again. He cast a look over his shoulder. It was +the same as if some one had touched him and spoken. + +He walked faster. The voice seemed to walk with him. “I will hold myself +firm,” he thought; “I will not be afraid. Reason does not fail a man +until he allows himself to _believe_ that it is failing. 'I am going +mad,' he thinks; and then he shrieks and is mad indeed. I will not +depart from my course. If I do so now, I shall be lost. The horror will +master me, and I shall be its slave for ever.” + +He had turned out of Ballure into the Ramsey Road, and he could see +the town lights in the distance. But the voice continued to haunt him +persistently, besiegingly, despotically. + +“Great God!” he thought, “what is the imaginary devil to the horror of +this presence? Your own eye, your own voice, always with you, always +following you! No darkness so dense that it can hide the sight, no noise +so loud that it can deaden the sound!” + +He walked faster. Still the voice seemed to stride by his side, an +invisible thing, with deliberate and noiseless step, from which there +was no escape. + +He drew up suddenly and walked slower. His knees were tottering, he was +treading as on waves; yet he went on. “I will not yield. I will master +myself. I will do what I intended. I am not mad,” he thought. + +He was at the gate of Elm Cottage by this time, and, with a strong glow +of resolution, he walked boldly to the door and knocked. + + + + +XVIII. + +Pete had not awakened until late that morning. While still in bed he +had heard Grannie and Nancy in the room below. The first sound of their +voices told him that something was amiss. + +“Aw, God bless me, God bless me!” said Nancy, as though with uplifted +hands. + +“It was Kelly the postman,” said Grannie in a doleful tone--the tone in +which she had spoken between the puffs of her pipe. + +“The dirt!” said Nancy. + +“He was up at Cæsar's before breakfast this morning,” said Grannie. + +“There now!” cried Nancy. “There's men like that, though. Just aiger for +mischief. It's sweeter than all their prayers to them.... But where can +she be, then? Has she made away with herself, poor thing?” + +“That's what I was asking Cæsar,” said Grannie. “If she's gone with +the young Ballawhaine, what for aren't you going to England over and +fetching her home?” says I. + +“And what did Cæsar say?” + +“'No,' says he, 'not a step,' says he. 'If she's dead,' says he, 'we'll +only know it a day the sooner, and if she's in life, it'll be a disgrace +to us the longest day we live.'” + +“Aw, bolla veen, bolla veen!” said Nancy. “When some men is getting +religion there's no more inside at them than a gutted herring, and +they're good for nothing but to put up in the chimley to smook.” + +“It's Black Tom, woman,” said Grannie. “Cæsar's freckened mortal of the +man's tongue going. 'It's water to his wheel,' he's saying. 'He'll be +telling me to set my own house in order, and me a local preacher, too.' +But how's the man himself?” + +“Pete?” said Nancy. “Aw, tired enough last night, and not down yet.... +Hush!... It's his foot on the loft.” + +“Poor boy! poor boy!” said Grannie. + +The child cried, and then somebody began to beat the floor to the +measure of a long-drawn hymn. Grannie must have been sitting before the +fire with the baby across her knees. + +“Something has happened,” thought Pete as he drew on his clothes. A +moment later something had happened indeed. He had opened a drawer of +the dressing-table and found the wedding-ring and the earrings where +Kate had left them. There was a commotion in the room below by this +time, but Pete did not hear it. He was crying in his heart. “It is +coming! I know it! I feel it! God help me! Lord forgive me! Amen! Amen!” + +Cæsar, the postman, and the constable, as a deputation from “The +Christians,” had just entered the house. Black Tom was with them. He was +the ferret that had fetched them out of their holes. + +“Get thee home, woman,” said Cæsar to Grannie, “This is no place for +thee. It is the abode of sin and deception.” + +“It's the home of my child's child, and that's enough for me,” said +Grannie. + +“Get thee back, I tell thee,” said Cæsar, “and come thee to this house +of shame no more.” + +“Take her, Nancy,” said Grannie, giving up the child. “Shame enough, +indeed, I'm thinking, when a woman has to shut her heart to her own +flesh and blood if she's not to disrespect her husband,” and she went +off, weeping. + +But Cæsar's emotions were walled in by his pietistical views. “Every +one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or +mother, or wife, or children, or land, for My name's sake, shall receive +an hundredfold,” said Cæsar, with a cast of his eye towards Black Tom. + +“Well, if I ever!” said Nancy. “The husband that wanted the like of +that from me now.... A hundredfold, indeed! No, not for a hundred +hundredfolds, the nasty dirt.” + +“Don't he turning up your nose, woman, but call your master,” said +Cæsar. + +“It's more than some ones need do, then, and I won't call my master, +neither--no, thank you,” said Nancy. + +“I've something to tell him, and I've come, too, for to do it,” said +Cæsar. + +“The devil came farther than ever you did, and it was only a lie he was +bringing for all that,” said Nancy. + +“Hould your tongue, Nancy Cain,” said Cæsar, “and take that Popish thing +off the child's head.” It was the scarlet hood. + +“Pity the money that's wasted on the like wasn't given to the poor.” + +“I've heard something the same before, Cæsar Cregeen,” said Nancy. “It +was Judas Iscariot was saying it first, and you're just thieving it from +a thief.” + +“Chut!” cried Cæsar, goaded by the laughter of Black Tom. “I'll call the +man myself. Peter Quilliam!” and he made for the staircase door. + +“Stand back,” cried Nancy, holding the child like a pillow over one of +her arms, and lifting the other threateningly. + +“Aw, you'll never be raising your hand to the man of God, woman,” + giggled Black Tom. + +“Won't I, though?” said Nancy grimly, “or the man of the devil either,” + she added, flashing at himself. + +“The woman's not to trust, sir,” snuffled the constable. “She's only an +infidel, anyway. I've heard tell of her saying she didn't believe the +whale swallowed Jonah.” + +“That's the diff'rance between us, then,” said Nancy; “for there's some +of you Manx ones would believe if Jonah swallowed the whale.” + +The staircase door opened at the back of Nancy, and Pete stepped into +the room. “What's this, friends?” he asked, in a careworn voice. + +Cæsar stepped forward with a yellow envelope in his hand. “What's +_that_, sir?” he answered. + +Pete took the envelope and opened it. + +“That's your letter back to you through the dead letter office, isn't +it?” said Cæsar. + +“Well?” said Pete. + +“There's nobody of that name in that place, is there!” said Cæsar. + +“Well?” said Pete again. + +“Letters from England don't come through Peel, but your first letter had +the Peel postmark, hadn't it?” + +“Well?” + +“Parcels from England don't come through Port St. Mary, but your parcel +was stamped in Port St. Mary, wasn't it?” + +“Anything else?” + +“The handwriting inside the letter wasn't your own handwriting, was it? +The address on the outside of the parcel wasn't your own address--no?” + +“Is that all?” + +“Enough to be going on, I'm thinking.” + +“What about Uncle Joe?” said Black Tom, with another giggle. + +“Your mistress is not in Liverpool. You don't know where she is. She has +gone the way of all sinners,” said Cæsar. + +“Is that what you're coming to tell me?” said Pete. + +“No; we're coming to tell you,” said Cæsar, “that, as a notorious loose +liver, we must be putting her out of class. And we're coming to call +on yourself to look to your own salvation. You've deceaved us, Mr. +Quilliam. You've grieved the Spirit of the Lord,” with another +“glime” in the direction of Black Tom; “you've brought contempt on the +fellowship that counts you for one of the fold. You've given the light +of your countenance to the path of an evildoer, and you've brought down +the head of a child of God with sorrow to the grave.” + +Cæsar was moved by his self-satisfied piety, and began to make' noises +in his nostrils. “Let us lay the case before the Lord,” he said; and he +went down on his knees and prayed-- + +“Our brother has deceived us, O Lord, but we forgive him freely. Forgive +Thou also his trespasses, so that at the last he escape hell-fire. Count +not Thy handmaid for a daughter of Belial, wherever she is this day. May +it be good for her to be cut off from the body of the righteous. Grant +that she feel this mercy in her carnal body before her eternal soul be +called to everlasting judgment. Lord, strengthen Thy servant. Let not +his natural affections be as the snare of the fowler unto his feet. +Though it grieve him sore, even to tears and tribulation, help him to +pluck out the gourd that groweth in his own bosom----” + +“Dear heart alive!” cried Nancy, clattering her clogs, “it's a wonder +in the world the man isn't thinking shame to blacken his own daughter +before the Almighty Himself.” + +“Be merciful, O Lord,” continued Cæsar, “to all rank unbelievers, and +such as live in heathen darkness in a Christian land, and don't know +Saturday from Sunday, and are imper-ent uncommon and bad with the +tongue----” + +“Stop that now.” cried Nancy, “that's meant for me.” + +Pete had stood through this in silence, but with an angry, miserable +face. + +“Beg pardon all,” he said. “I'm not going for denying to what you say. +I'm like the fish at the heel of the trawl-boat--the net's closing in on +me and I'm caught. The game's up. I did deceave you. I _did_ write +those letters myself. I've no Uncle Joe, nor no Auntie Joney neither. My +wife's left me. I'm not knowing where she is, or what's becoming of her. +I'm done, and I'm for throwing up the sponge.” + +There were grunts of satisfaction. “But don't you feel the need of +pardon, brother,” said Cæsar. + +“I don't,” said Pete. “What I was doing I was doing for the best, and, +if I was doing wrong, the Almighty will have to forgive me--that's about +all.” + +Cæsar shot out his lip. Pete raised himself to his full height and +looked from face to face, until his eyes settled on the postman. + +“But it takes a thief to catch a thief,” he said. “Which of you was the +thief that catcht me? Maybe I've been only a blundering blockhead, and +perhaps you've been clever, and smart uncommon, but I'm thinking there's +some of you hasn't been rocked enough for all that.” + +He held out the yellow envelope. “This letter was sealed when you gave +it to me, Mr. Cregeen--how did you know what was inside of it? 'On +Her Majesty's Sarvice,' you say. But it isn't dead letters only that's +coming with words same as that.” + +The postman was meddling with his front hair. + +“The Lord has His own wayses of doing His work, has He, Cæsar? I never +heard tell, though, that opening other people's letters was one of +them.” + +Mr. Kelly's ferret eyes were nearly twinkling themselves out. + +Pete threw letter and envelope into the fire. “You've come to tell me +you're going to turn my wife out of class. All right! You can turn me +out, too, and if the money I gave you is anywhere handy, you can turn +that out at the same time and make a clane job.” + +Black Tom was doubling with suppressed laughter at the corner of the +dresser, and Cæsar was writhing under his searching glances. + +“You're knowing a dale about the ould Book and I'm not knowing much,” + said Pete, “but isn't it saying somewhere, 'Let him that's without sin +amongst you chuck the first stone?' I'm not worth mentioning for a saint +myself, so I lave it with you.” + +His voice began to break. “You're thinking a dale about the broken law +seemingly, but I'm thinking more about the broken heart. There's the +like in somewhere, you go bail. The woman that's gone may have done +wrong--I'm not saying she didn't, poor thing; but if she comes home +again, you may turn her out, but I'll take her back, whatever she is and +whatever she's done--so help me God I will--and I'll not wait for the +Day of Judgment to ask the Almighty if I'm doing right.” + +Then he sat down with his back to them on a chair before the fire. + +“Now you can go home to nurse,” said Nancy, wiping her eyes, “and lave +me to sweeten the kitchen--it's wanting water enough after dirts like +you.” + +Cæsar also was wiping his eye--the one nearest to Black Tom. “Come,” he +said with plaintive resignation, “our errand was useless. The Ethiopian +cannot change his skin, nor the leopard his spots.” + +“No, but he can get a topcoat to cover them, though,” said Nancy. “Oh, +that flea sticks, does it, Cæsar? Don't blame the looking-glass if your +face is ugly.” + +Cæsar pretended not to hear her. “Well,” he said, with a sigh discharged +at Pete's back, “we'll pray, spite of appearances, that we may all go to +heaven together some day.” + +“No, thank you, not me,” said Nancy. “I wouldn't be-mane myself going +anywhere with the like of you.” + +The Job in Cæsar could bear up no longer. “Vain and ungrateful woman,” + he cried, “who hath eaten of my bread and drunken of my cup----” + +“Cursing me, are you?” said Nancy. “Sakes! you must have been found in +the bulrushes at Pharaoh's daughter and made a prophet of.” + +“No use bandying words, sir, wid a single woman dat lives alone wid a +single man,” said Mr. Niplightly. + +Nancy flopped the child from her right arm to her left, and with the +back of her hand she slapped the constable across the face. “Take that +for the cure of a bad heart,” she said, “and tell the Dempster I gave it +you.” + +Then she turned on the postman and Black Tom. “Out of it, you lil thief, +your mouth's only a dirty town-well and your tongue's the pump in it. Go +home and die, you big black spider--you're ould enough for it and wicked +enough, too. Out of it, the lot of you!” she cried, and clashed the door +at their backs, and then opened it again for a parting shot. “And if +it's true you're on your way to heaven together, just let me know, and +I'll see if I can't put up with the other place myself.” + + + + +XIX. + +That evening Pete was sitting with one foot on the cradle rocker, one +arm on the table, and the other hand trifling tenderly with the ring +and the earrings which he had found in the drawer of the dressing-table, +when there was a hurried knock on the door. It had the hollow +reverberation of a knock on the lid of a coffin. + +“Come in,” called Pete. + +It was Philip, but it was almost as if Death had entered, so thin and +bony were his cheeks, so wild his eyes, so cold his hands. + +Pete was prepared for anything. “You've found me out, too, I see you +have,” he said defiantly. “You needn't tell _me_--it's chasing caught +fish.” + +“Be brave, Pete,” said Philip. “It will be a great shock to you.” + +Pete looked up and his manner changed. “Speak it out, sir. It's a poor +man that can't stand----” + +“I've come on the saddest errand,” said Philip, taking a seat as far +away as possible. + +“You've found her--you've seen her, sir. Where is she?” + +“She is----” began Philip, and then he stopped. + +“Go on, mate; I've known trouble before to-day,” said Pete. + +“Can you bear it?” said Philip. “She is----” and he stopped again. + +“She is--where?” said Pete. + +“She is dead,” said Philip at last. + +Pete rose to his feet. Philip rose also, and now poured out his message +with the headlong rush of a cataract. + +“In fact, it all happened some time ago, Pete, but I couldn't +bring myself to tell you before. I tried, but I couldn't. It was in +Douglas--of a fever--in a lodging--alone--unattended----” + +“Hould hard, sir! Give me time,” said Pete. “I'd a gunshot wound +at Kimberley, and since then I've a stitch in my side at whiles and +sometimes a bit of a catch in my breathing.” + +He staggered to the porch door and threw it open, then came back +panting--“Dead! dead! Kate is dead!” + +Nancy came from the kitchen at the moment, and hearing what he was +saying, she lifted both hands and uttered a piercing shriek. He took +her by the shoulders and turned her back, shut the door behind her, and +said, holding his right hand hard at his side, “Women are brave, sir, +but when the storm breaks on a man----” He broke off and muttered again, +“Dead! Kirry is dead!” + +The child, awakened by Nancy's cry, was now whimpering fretfully. Pete +went to the cradle and rocked it with one foot, crooning in a quavering +treble, “Hush-a-bye! hush-a-bye!” + +Philip's breathing was oppressed. He felt like a man at the edge of a +precipice, with an impulse to throw himself over. “God forgive me,” he +said. “I could kill myself. I've broken your heart;----” + +“No fear of me, sir,” said Pete. “I'm an ould hulk that's seen weather. +I'll not go to pieces from inside at all. Give me time, mate, give +me time.” And then he went on muttering as before, “Dead! Kirry dead! +Hush-a-bye! My Kirry dead!” + +The little one slept, and Pete drew back in his chair, nodded into the +fire, and said in a weak, childish voice, “I've known her all my life, +d'ye know? She's been my lil sweetheart since she was a slip of a girl, +and slapped the schoolmaster for bating me wrongously. Swate lil thing +in them days, mate, with her brown feet and tossing hair. And now she's +a woman and she's dead! The Lord have mercy upon me!” + +He got up and began to walk heavily across the floor, dipping and +plunging as if going upstairs. “The bright and happy she was when I +started for Kimberley, too; with her pretty face by the aising stones in +the morning, all laughter and mischief. Five years I was seeing it in my +drames like that, and now it's gone. Kirry is gone! My Kirry! God help +me! O God, have mercy upon me!” + +He stopped in his unsteady walk, and sat and stared into the fire. His +eyes were red; blotches of heart's blood seemed to be rising to them; +but there was not the sign of a tear. Philip did not attempt to console +him. He felt as if the first syllable would choke in his throat. + +“I see how it's been, sir,” said Pete. “While I was away her heart was +changing her, and when I came back she thought she must keep her word. +My poor lamb! She was only a child anyway. But I was a man--I ought to +have seen how it was. I'm like a drowning man, too--things are coming +back on me. I'm seeing them plain enough now. But it's too late! My poor +Kirry! And I thought I was making her so happy!” Then, with a helpless +look, “You wouldn't believe it, sir, but I was never once thinking +nothing else. No, I wasn't; it's a fact. I was same as a sailor working +all the voyage home, making a cage, and painting it goold, for the +love-bird he's catcht in the sunny lands somewhere; but when he's +putting it in, it's only wanting away, poor thing.” + +With a sense of grovelling meanness, Philip sat and listened. Then, with +eyes wandering across the floor, he said, “You have nothing to reproach +yourself with. You did everything a man could do--everything. And she +was innocent also. It was the fault of another. He came between +you. Perhaps he thought he couldn't help it--perhaps he persuaded +himself--God knows what lie he told himself--but she's innocent, Pete; +believe me, she's----” + +Pete brought his fist down heavily on the table, and the rings that lay +on it jumped and tingled. “What's that to me?” he cried hoarsely. “What +do I care if she's innocent or guilty? She's dead, isn't she? and that's +enough. Curse the man! I don't want to hear of him. She's mine now. What +for should he come here between me and my own?” + +The torn heart and racked brain could bear no more. Pete dropped his +head on the table. Presently his anger ebbed. Without lifting his +head, he stretched his hand across the rings to feel for Philip's hand. +Philip's hand trembled in his grasp. He took that for sympathy, and +became the more ashamed. + +“Give me time, mate,” he said. “I'll be my own man soon. My head's +moithered dreadful--I'm not knowing if I heard you right. In Douglas, +you say? By herself, too? Not by herself, surely? Not quite alone +neither? She found you out, didn't she? _You'd_ be there, Phil? You'd be +with her yourself? She'd be wanting for nothing?” + +Philip answered huskily, his eyes still wandering. “If it will be any +comfort to you... yes, I _was_ with her--she wanted for nothing.” + +“My poor girl!” said Pete. “Did she send--had she any--maybe she said a +word or two--at the last, eh?” + +Philip clutched at the question. There was something at last that he +could say without falsehood. “She sent a prayer for your forgiveness,” + he said. “She told me to tell you to think of her as little as might be; +not to grieve for her too much, and to try to forget her, so that her +sin also might be forgotten.” + +“And the lil one--anything about the lil one?” asked Pete. + +“That was the bitterest grief of all,” said Philip. “It was so hard +that you must think her an unnatural mother. 'My Katherine! My little +Katherine! My sweet angel!' It was her cry the whole day long.” + +“I see, I see,” said Pete, nodding at the fire; “she left the lil +one for my sake, wanting it with her all the while. Poor thing! You'd +comfort her, Philip? You'd let her go aisy?” + +“'The child is well and happy,' I told her. 'He's thinking nothing of +yourself but what is good and kind,' I said.” + +“God's peace rest on her! My darling! My wife!” said Pete solemnly. Then +suddenly in another tone, “Do you know where she's buried?” + +Philip hesitated. He had not foreseen this question. Where had been his +head that he had never thought of it? But there was no going back now. +He was compelled to go on. He must tell lie on lie. “Yes,” he faltered. + +“Could you take me to the grave?” + +Philip gasped; the sweat broke out on his forehead. + +“Don't be freckened, sir,” said Pete; “I'm my own man again. Could you +take me to my wife's grave?” + +“Yes,” said Philip. He was in the rapids. He was on the edge of +precipitation. He was compelled to go over. He made a blindfold plunge. +Lie on lie; lie on lie! + +“Then we'll start by the coach to-morrow,” said Pete. + +Philip rose with rigid limbs. He had meant to tell one lie only, and +already he had told many. Truly “a lie is a cripple;” it cannot stand +alone. “Good night, Pete; I'll go home. I'm not well to-night.” + +“We'll stop the coach at your aunt's gate in the morning,” said Pete. + +They stepped to the door together, and stood for a moment in the dank +and lifeless darkness. + +“The world's getting wonderful lonely, man, and you're all that's left +to me now, Phil--you and the child. I'm not for wailing, though. When +I got my gun-shot wound out yonder, I was away over the big veldt, +hundreds of miles from anywhere, behind the last bush and the last blade +of grass, with the stones and the ashes and the dust--about as far, +you'd say, as the world was finished, and never looking to see herself +and the ould island and the ould faces no more. I'm not so lonesome as +that at all. Good-night, ould fellow, and God bless you!” + +The gate opened and closed, Philip went stumbling up the road. He was +hating Pete. To hate this open-hearted man who had dragged him into an +entanglement of lies was the only resource of his stifled conscience. + +Pete went back to the house, muttering, “Kirry is dead! Kirry is dead!” + He put the catch on the door, said, “Close the shutters, Nancy,” and +then returned to his chair by the cradle. + + + + +XX. + +Later the same night Pete carried the news to Sulby. Grannie was in the +bar-room, and he broke it to her gently, tenderly, lovingly. + +Loud voices came from the kitchen. Cæsar was there in angry contention +with Black Tom. An open Bible was between them on their knees. Tom +tugged it towards him, bobbed his blunt forefinger down on the page, and +cried, “There's the text--that'll pin you--_publicans and sinners_.” + +Cæsar leaned back'in his seat, and said with withering scorn, “It's a +bad business--I'll give you lave to say that. It's men like you that's +making it bad. But whether is it better for a bad business to be in bad +hands or in good ones? There's a big local praicher in London, they're +telling me, that's hot for joining the public-house to the church, and +turning the parsons into the publicans. That's what they all were on +the Isle of Man in ould days gone by, and pity they're not so still. +Oh, I've been giving it my sarious thoughts, sir. I've been making it +a subject for prayer. 'Will I give up my public or hould fast to it to +keep it out of worse hands?' And I'm strong to believe the Lord hath +spoken. 'It's a little vineyard--a little work in a little vineyard. +Stick to it, Cæsar,' and so I will.” + +Pete stepped into the kitchen and flung his news at Cæsar with a sort of +wild melancholy, as who would say, “There, is that enough for you? Are +you satisfied now?” + +“_Mair yee shoh_--it's the hand of God,” said Cæsar. + +“A middling bad hand then,” said Pete; “I've seen better, anyway.” + +A high spiritual pride took hold of Cæsar--Black Tom was watching him, +and working his big eyebrows vigorously. With mouth firmly shut and head +thrown back, Cæsar said in a sepulchral voice, “The Lord gave, and the +Lord hath taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord!” + +Pete made a crack of savage laughter. + +“Aren't you feeling it, sir?” said Cæsar. + +“Not a feel near me,” said Pete. “I never did the Lord no harm that I +know of, but He's taken my young wife and left my poor innocent lil one +motherless.” + +“Unsearchable the wisdom and justice of God,” said Cæsar. + +“Unsearchable?” said Pete. “It's all that. But I don't know if you're +calling it justice. I'm not myself. It isn't my tally. Blasphemy? I lave +it with you. A scoffer, am I? So be it. The Lord's licked me, and I've +had enough. But I'm not going down on my knees for it, anyway. The +Almighty and me is about quits.” + +With that word on his lips he strode out of the place, grim, implacable, +almost savage, a fierce smile fluttering on his ashy face. + + + + +XXI. + +Grannie came to Elm Cottage next morning with two duck eggs for Pete's +breakfast. She was boiling them in a saucepan when Pete came downstairs. + +“Come now,” she said coaxingly, as she laid them on the table, with the +water smoking off the shells. But Pete could not eat. + +“He hasn't destroyed any food these days,” said Nancy. A little before +she had rolled her apron, slipped out into the street, and brought back +a tiny packet screwed up in a bit of newspaper. + +“Perhaps he'll ate them on the road,” said Grannie. “I'll put them in +the hankerchief in his hat anyway.” + +“My faith, no, woman!” cried Nancy. “He's the mischief for sweating. +He'll be mopping his forehead and forgetting the eggs. But here--where's +your waistcoat pocket, Pete? Have you room for a hayseed anywhere? +There!... It's a quarter of twist, poor boy,” she whispered behind her +hand to Grannie. + +Thus they vied with each other in little attentions to the down-hearted +man. Meantime Crow, the driver of the Douglas coach, a merry old sinner +with a bulbous nose and short hair, standing erect like the steel pins +of an electric brush, was whistling as he put his horses to in the +marketplace. Presently he swirled round the corner and drew up at the +gate. The women then became suddenly quiet, and put their aprons to +their mouths, as if a hearse had stopped at the door; but Pete bustled +about and shouted boisterously to cover the emotion of his farewell. + +“Good-bye, Grannie; I'll say a word for you when I get there. Good-bye, +Nancy; I'll not be forgetting yourself neither. Good bye, lil bogh,” + dropping on one knee at the side of the cradle. “What right has a man's +heart to be going losing him while he has a lil innocent like this to +live for? Good-bye!” + +There was a throng of women at the gate talking of Kate. “Aw, a civil +person, very--a civiller person never was.”--“It's me that'll be missing +her too. I served her eggs to the day of her death, as you might say. +'Good morning, Christian Anne,' says she--just like that. Welcome, you +say? I was at home at the woman's door.”--“And the beautiful she came +home in the gig with the baby! Only yesterday you might say. And now, +Lord-a-massy!”--“Hush! it's himself! I'm fit enough to cry when I look +at the man. The cheerful heart is broke at him.”--“Hush!” + +They dropped their heads so that Pete might avoid their gaze, and held +the coach-door open for him, expecting that he would go inside, as to a +funeral. But he saluted them with “Good morning all,” and leapt to the +box-seat with Crow. + +The coach stopped to take up the Deemster at the gate of Ballure House. +Philip looked thin and emaciated, and walked with a death-like weakness, +but also a feverish resolution. Behind him, carrying a rag, came Aunty +Nan in her white cap, with little nervous attentions, and a face full of +anxiety. + +“Drive inside to-day, Philip,” she said. + +“No, no,” he answered, and kissed her, pushed her to the other side of +the gate with gentle protestation, and climbed to Pete's side. Then the +old lady said-- + +“Good-morning, Peter. I'm so sorry for your great trouble, and trust... +But you'll not let the Deemster ride too long outside if it grows... +He's had a sleepless night and----” + +“Go on, Crow,” said Philip, in a decisive voice. + +“I'll see to that, Miss Christian, ma'am,” shouted Crow over his +shoulder. “His honour's studdying a bit too hard--that's what _he_ +is. But a gentleman's not much use if his wife's a widow, as the man +said--eh? Looking well enough yourself, though, Miss Christian, ma'am. +Getting younger every day, in fact. I'll have to be fetching that East +Indee capt'n up yet. I will that. Ha! ha! Get on, Boxer!” Then, with a +flick of the whip, they were off on their journey. + +The day was calm and beautiful. Old Barrule wore his yellow skull-cap of +flowering gorse, the birds sang on the trees, and the sea on the shore +sang also with the sound of far-off joy-bells. It was a heart-breaking +day to Pete, but he tried to bear himself bravely. + +He was seated between Philip and the driver. On the farther side of Crow +there were two other passengers, a farmer and a fisherman. The farmer, a +foul-mouthed fellow with a long staff and two dogs racing and barking +on the road, was returning from Midsummer fair, at which he had sold +his sheep; the fisherman, a simple creature, was coming home from the +mackerel-fishing at Kinsale, with a box of the fish between his legs. + +“The wife's been having a lil one since I was laving in March,” said +the fisherman, laughing all over his bronzed face. “A boy, d'ye say? +Aw, another boy, of coorse. Three of them now--all men. Got a letter at +Ramsey post-office coming through. She's getting on as nice as nice, and +the ould woman's busy doing for her.” + +“Gee up, Boxer--we'll wet its head at the Hibernian,” said Crow. + +“I'm not partic'lar at all,” said the fisherman cheerily. “The +mack'rel's been doing middling this season, anyway.” + +And then in his simple way he went on to paint home, and the joy of +coming back to it, with the new baby, and the mother in child-bed, and +the grandmother as housekeeper, and the other children waiting for new +frocks and new jackets out of the earnings of the fishing, and himself +going round to pay the grocer what had been put on “strap” while he was +at Kin-sale, till Pete was melted, and could listen no longer. + +“I'm persuaded still she wasn't well when she went away,” he whispered, +turning his shoulder to the men and his face to Philip. He talked in +a low voice, just above the rumble of the wheels, trying to extenuate +Kate's fault and to excuse her to Philip. + +“It's no use thinking hard of anybody, is it, sir?” he said. “We can't +crawl into another person's soul, as the saying is.” + +After that he asked many questions--about Kate's illness, about the +doctor, about the funeral, about everything except the man--of him he +asked nothing. Philip was compelled to answer. He was like a prisoner +chained at the galleys--he was forced to go on. They crossed the bridge +over the top of Ballaglass, which goes down to the mill at Cornaa. + +“There's the glen, sir,” said Pete. “Aw, the dear ould days! Wading in +the water, leaping over the stones, clambering on the trunks--aw, dear! +aw, dear! Bareheaded and barefooted in those times, sir; but smart +extraordinary, and a terble notion of being dressy, too. Twisting ferns +about her lil neck for lace, sticking a mountain thistle, sparkling with +dew, on her breast for a diamond, twining a trail of fuchsia round her +head for a crown--aw, dear! aw, dear! And now--well, well, to think! to +think!” + +There was laughter on the other side of the coach. + +“What do _you_ say, Capt'n Pete?” shouted Crow. + +“What's that?” asked Pete. + +The fisherman had treated the driver and the farmer at the Hibernian, +and was being rewarded with robustious chaff. + +“I'm telling Dan Johnny here these childers that's coming when a man's +away from home isn't much to trust. Best put a sight up with the lil one +to the wise woman of Glen Aldyn, eh? A man doesn't like to bring up a +cuckoo in the nest--what d'ye say, Capt'n?” + +“I say you're a dirty ould divil, Crow; and I don't want to be chucking +you off your seat,” said Pete; and with that he turned back to Philip. * + +The driver was affronted, but the farmer pacified him by an appeal to +his fear. “He'd be coarse to tackle, the same fellow--I saw him clane +out a tent with one hand at Tyn-wald.” + +“It's a wonder she didn't come home for all,” said Pete at Philip's +ear--“at the end, you know. Couldn't face it out, I suppose? Nothing to +be afraid of, though, if she'd only known. I had kept things middling +straight up to then. And I'd have broke the head of the first man that'd +wagged a tongue. But maybe it was myself she was freckened of! Freckened +of me! Poor thing! poor thing!” + +Philip was in torment. To witness Pete's simple grief, to hear him +breathe a forgiveness for the erring woman, and to be trusted with the +thoughts of his heart as a father might be trusted by a young child--it +was anguish, it was agony, it was horror. More than once he felt an +impulse to cast off his load, to confess, to tell everything. But he +reflected that he had no right to do this--that the secret was not his +own to give away. His fear restrained him also. He looked into Pete's +face, so full of manly sorrow, and shuddered to think of it transformed +by rage. + +“Sit hard, gentlemen. Breeches' work here,” shouted Crow. + +They were at the top of the steep descent going down to Laxey. The +white town lay sprinkled over the green banks of the glen, and the great +water-wheel stood in the depths of the mountain gill behind it. + +“She's there! She's yonder! It's herself at the door. She's up. She's +looking out for the coach,” cried the fisherman, clambering up on to the +seat. + +“Aisy all,” shouted Crow. + +“No use, Mr. Crow. Nothing will persuade me but that's herself with the +lil one in a blanket at the door.” + +Before the coach had drawn up at the bridge, the fisherman had leapt +to the ground, shouldered his keg, shouted “Good everin' all,” and +disappeared down an alley of the town. + +The driver alighted. A crowd gathered around. There were parcels to take +up, parcels to set down, and the horses to water. When the coach was +ready to start again, the farmer with his dogs had gone, but there was a +passenger for an inside place. It was a girl, a bright young thing, with +a comely face and laughing black eyes. She was dressed smartly, after +her country fashion, in a hat covered with scarlet poppies, and with a +vast brooch at the neck of her bodice. In one hand she carried a huge +bunch of sweet-smelling gilvers. A group of girl companions came to see +her off, and there was much giggling and chatter and general excitement. + +“Are you forgetting the pouch and pipe, Emma?” + +“Let me see; am I? No; it's here in my frock.” + +“Well, you'll be coming together by the coach at nine, it's like?” + +“It's like we will, Liza, if the steamer isn't late.” + +“Now then, ladies, off the step! Any room for a lil calf' in the straw +with you, missy? Freckened? Tut! Only a lil calf, as clane as clane--and +breath as swate as your own, miss. There you are--it'll be lying quiet +enough till we get to Douglas. All ready? Ready we are then. Collar work +now, gentlemen. Aise the horse, sir. Thank you! Thank you! Not you, your +Honour--sit where you are, Dempster.” + + + + +XXII. + +Pete got down to walk up the hill, but Philip, though he made some show +of alighting also, was glad of the excuse to remain in his seat. It +relieved him of Pete's company for a while, at all events. He had time +to ask himself again why he was there, where he was going to, and what +he was going to do. But his brain was a cloudy waste. Only one picture +emerged from the maze. It was that of the burial of the nameless waif in +the grave at the foot of the wall. If he was conscious of any purpose, +it was a vague idea of going to that grave. But it lay ahead of him only +as an ultimate goal. He was waiting and watching for an opportunity of +escape. If it came, God be praised! If it did not come, God help and +forgive him! + +Meanwhile Pete walked behind, and caught fragments of a conversation +between the girl and Crow. + +“So you're going to meet himself coming home, miss, eh?” + +“My faith, how d'ye know that? But it's yourself for knowing things, Mr. +Crow. Has he been sailing foreign? Yes, sir; and nine months away for +a week come Monday. But spoken at Holyhead in Tuesday's paper, and paid +off in Liverpool yesterday. That's his 'nitials, if you want to know--J. +W. I worked them on the pouch myself. I've spun him a web for a jacket, +too. Sweethearting with the miner fellows while Jemmy's been away? Have +I, d'ye say? How people _will_ be talking!” + +“Aw, no offence at all. But sorry you're not keeping another string to +your bow, missy. These sailor lads aren't partic'lar, anyway. Bless your +heart, no; but getting as tired of one swateheart as a pig of brewer's +grain. Constant? Chut! When the like of that sort is away foreign, he +lays up of the first girl he comes foul of.” + +The girl laughed, and shook her head bravely, but the tears were +beginning to trickle from her eyes, and the hand that held the flowers +was trembling. + +“Don't listen to the man, my dear,” said Pete. “There's too much comic +in these ould bachelor bucks. Your boy is dying to get home to you. Go +bail on that, Emma. The packet isn't making half way enough for him, and +he's bad dreadful wanting to ship aloft and let out the topsail.” + +At the crest of the hill Pete climbed back to Philip's side, and +said, “The heart's a quare thing, sir. Got its winds and tides same as +anything else. The wind blows contrary ways in one day, and it's the +same with the heart itself. Changeable? Well, maybe! We shouldn't be too +hard on it for all.... If I'd only known now.... She wasn't much better +than a child when I left for Kimberley... and then what was I? I was +only common stuff anyway... not much fit for the likes of herself, when +you think of it, sir.... If I'd only guessed when I came back.... I +could have done it, sir--I was loving the woman like life, but if I'd +only known, now.... Well, and what's love if it's thinking of nothing +but itself? If I'd thought she was loving another man by the time I came +home, I could have given her up to him--yes, I could; I'm persuaded I +could---so help me God, I could.” + +Philip was wasting on that journey like a piece of wax. Pete saw his +face melting away till it looked more like a skeleton than the face of à +man really alive. + +“You mustn't be taking it so bad at all, Phil,” said Pete. “She'll be +middling right where she's gone to, sir. She'll be right enough yonder,” + he said, rolling his head sideways to where the sun was going round to +its setting. And then softly, as if half afraid she might not be, he +muttered into his beard, “God be good to my poor broken-hearted girl, +and forgive her sins for Christ's sake.” + +An elderly gentleman got on the coach at Onchan. + +“Helloa, Deemster!” he cried. “You look as sober as an old crow. Sober! +Old Crow! Ha, ha!” + +He was a facetious person of high descent in the island. + +“Crow never goes home without getting off the box once or twice to pick +up the moonlight on the road--do you, Crow?” + +“That'll do, parson, that'll do!” roared Crow. And then his reverence +leaned across the driver and directed the shaft of his wit at Philip. + +“And how's the young housekeeper, Deemster?” + +Philip shuddered visibly, and made some inarticulate reply-- + +“Good-looking young woman, they're telling me. Jem-y-Lord's got taste, +seemingly. But take care, your Honour; take care! 'Thou shalt not covet +thy neighbour's wife, nor his ox, nor his ass'----” + +Philip laughed noisily. The miserable man was writhing in his seat. + +“Take an old fiddler's advice, Deemster--have nothing to do with the +women. When they're young they're kittens to play with you, but when +they're old they're cats to scratch you.” + +Pete twisted his body until the whole breadth of his back blocked the +parson from Philip's face. + +“A fortnight ago, you were saying, sir?” + +“A fortnight,” muttered Philip. + +“There'll be daisies growing on her grave by this time,” said Pete +softly. + +The parson had put up his nose-glasses. “Who's this fellow, Crow? +Captain--what? His honour's cousin? _Cousin?_ Oh, of course--yes--I +remember--Tynwald--ah--h'm!” + +The coach set down its passengers in the market-place. Pete inquired the +hour of its return journey, and was told that it started back at six. He +helped the girl to alight, and directed her to the pier, where a crowd +of people' were awaiting the arrival of the steamer. Then he rejoined +Philip, who led the way through the town. + +The Deemster was observed by everybody. As he passed along the streets +there was much whispering and nudging, and some bowing and lifting +of hats. He responded to none of it He recognised no one. He, who was +famous for courtesy, renowned for gracious manners, beloved for a smile +like sunshine--the brighter and more winsome when it broke as from a +cloud--returned no man's salutation that day, and replied to no woman's +greeting. His face was set hard like a marble mask. It passed along +without appearing to see. + +Pete walked one step behind. They did not speak as they went through +the town. Not a word or a sign passed between them. Philip turned into +a side street, and drew up at an iron gate which opened on to a +churchyard. They were at the churchyard of St. George's. + +“This is the place,” said Philip huskily. + +Pete took off his hat. + +The gate was partly open. It was Saturday, and the organist was alone in +the church practising hymns for Sunday's services. They passed through. + +The churchyard was an oblong enclosure within high walls, overlooked on +its long sides by rows of houses. One of these rows was Athol Street, +and one of the houses was the Deemster's. + +It was late afternoon by this time. Long shadows were cast eastward +from the tombstones; the horizontal sunlight was making the leaves very +light. + +Philip walked noisily, jerkily, irregularly, like a man conscious of +weakness and determined to conquer it. Pete walked behind, so softly +that his foot on the gravel was hardly to be heard. The organist was +playing Cowper's familiar hymn-- + + “God moves in a mysterious way + His wonders to perform.” + +There was a broad avenue, bordered by railed tombs, leading to the +church-door. Philip turned out of this into a narrow path which went +through a bare green space, that was dotted with pegs of wood and little +unhewn slabs of slate, like an abandoned quoit ground. At the farthest +corner of this space he stopped before a mound near to the wall. It was +the new-made grave. The scars of the turf were still unhealed, and the +glist of the spade was on the grass. + +Philip hesitated a moment, and looked round at Pete, as if even then, +even there, he would confess. But he saw no escape from the mesh of his +own lies, and with a deep, breath of submission he pointed down, turned +his head over his shoulder, and said in a strange voice-- + +“There.” + +The silence was long and awful. At length Pete said in a broken +whisper-- + +“Lave me, sir, lave me.” + +Philip turned away, breathing audibly. A moment longer Pete stood where +he was, gripping his hat with both hands in front of him. Then he went +down on his knees. “Oh, forgive me my hard thoughts of thee,” he said. +“Jesus, forgive me my hard thoughts of my poor Kirry.” + +Philip heard no more. The organ was very loud and triumphant. + + “Deep in unfathomable mines + Of never-failing skill, + He treasures up His bright designs + And works His sovereign will.” + +A red shaft of sunlight tipped down on Pete's uncovered head from the +top of the wall. The blessed tears had come to him. He was sobbing +aloud; he was alone with his love at last. + +He was alone with her indeed. At that moment Kate was looking down from +the window of her room. She saw him kneeling and praying by another's +grave. + +Philip never knew how he got out of the churchyard. He crawled +out--creeping along by the wall, and slinking through the +gate--heart-sick and all but heart-dead. When he came to himself, he +was standing in Athol Street, and a company of jolly fellows in a +jaunting-car, driving out of the golden sunset, were rattling past him +with shouts and peals of laughter. + + + + +XXIII. + +Kate was standing in her room with the door open, beating her hands +together in the first helpless stupor of fear, when she saw a man coming +up the stairs. His legs seemed to be giving way as he ascended; he was +bent and feeble, and had all the look of great age. As he approached he +lifted his face, which was old and withered. Then she saw who it was. It +was Philip. + +She made an involuntary cry, and he smiled upon her--a hard, frozen, +terrible smile. “He is lost,” she thought. Her scared expression +penetrated to his soul. He knew that she had seen everything. At first +he tried to speak, but he could utter nothing. Then a mad desire seized +him to lay hold of her--by the arms, by the shoulders, by the throat. +Conquering this impulse, he stood motionless, passing his hands through +his hair. She dropped her eyes and hung her head. Their abasement in +each other's eyes was complete. He was ashamed before her, she was +ashamed before him. One moment they faced each other thus, in silence, +in pitiless and awful silence, and then slowly, very slowly, stupefied +and crushed, he turned away and crept out of the house. + +“It is the end--the end.” What was the use of going farther? He +had fallen too low. His degradation was abject. It was hopeless, +irreparable, irremediable. “End it all--end it all.” The words clamoured +in his inmost soul. + +Halting down the quay, he made for the ferry steps, where boats were +waiting for hire. He had lately hired one of an evening, and pulled +round the Head for the sake of the breath and the silence of the sea. + +“Going far out this evening, your Honor?” the boatman asked. + +“Farther than ever,” he answered. + +Pull, pull! Away from the terrible past. Away from the horrible present. +The steamer had arrived, and had discharged her passengers. She was +still pulsing at the end of the red pier like a horse that pants after +running a race. + +A band was playing a waltz somewhere on the promenade. Pleasure boats +were darting about the bay. Sea-birds were sitting on the water where +the sewers of the gay little town empty into the sea. + +Pull, pull! He was flying from remorse, from despair, from the deep +duplicity of a double life, from the lie that had slain the heart of a +living man. How low he had fallen! Could he fall lower without falling +into crime? + +Pull, pull! He would be a criminal next. When a man had been degraded +in his own eyes, and in the eyes of her he loved, crime stood beckoning +him. He might try, but he could not resist; he must yield, he must fall. +It was the only degradation remaining. Better end everything before +dropping into that last abyss. + +Pull, pull! He was the judge of his island, and he had outraged justice. +Holding a false title, living on a false honour, he was safe of no man's +respect, secure of no woman's goodwill. Exposure hung over him. He would +be disgraced, the law would be disgraced, the island would be disgraced. +Pull, pull, pull, before it is too late; out, far out, farther than tide +returns, or sea tells stories to the shore. + +He had rowed like a slave escaping from his chains, in terror of being +overtaken and dragged back. The voices of the harbour were now hushed, +the music of the band was deadened, the horses running along the +promenade seemed to creep like ants, and the traffic of the streets was +no louder than a dull subterranean rumble. He had shot out of the margin +of smooth blue water in which the island lay as on a mirror, and out of +the shadow of the hill upon the bay. The sea about him now was running +green and glistening, and the red sun-? light was coming down on it like +smoke. Only the steeples and towers and glass domes of the town reached +up into luminous air. He could see the squat tower of St. George's +silhouetted against the dying glory of the sky. Seven years he had been +its neighbour, and it had witnessed such happy and such cruel hours. All +the joy of work, the sweetness of success, the dreams of greatness, the +rosy flushes of love, and then--the tortures of conscience, the visions, +the horror, the secret shame, the self-abandonment, and, last of all, +the twofold existence as of husband with wife, hidden, incomplete, +unfulfilled, yet full of tender ties which had seemed like galling bonds +so many a time, but were now so sweet when the hour had come to break +them. + +How distant it all appeared to be! And was he flying from the island +like this? The island that had honoured him, that had rewarded him +beyond his deserts, and earlier than his dreams, that had suffered no +jealousy to impede him, no rivalry to fret him, no disparity of age and +service to hold him back--the little island that had seemed to open its +arms to him, and to cry, “Philip Christian, son of your father, grandson +of your grandfather, first of Manxmen, come up!” + +Oh, for what might have been! Useless regrets! Pull, pull, and forget. + +But the home of his childhood! Ballure--Auntie Nan--his father's death +brightened by one hope--the last, but ah! how vain!--Port Mooar--Pete, +“The sea's calling me.” Pull, pull! The sea was calling him indeed. +Calling him to the deep womb that is death, not birth. + +He was far out. The sun had gone, the island was like a bird of ashy +grey stretched across the horizon; the great wing of night was coming +down from the sky, and up out the mysterious depths of the sea came the +profound hum, the mighty voice that is the organ of the world. + +He took in the oars, and his tiny shell began to drift At that moment +his eye caught something at the bottom of the boat. It was a flower, a +broken stem, a torn rose, and a few scattered rose leaves. Only a relic +of the last occupants, but it brought back the perfume of love, a sense +of tenderness, of bright eyes, of a caress, a kiss. His mind went back +to Sulby, to the Melliah, to the glen, to the days so full of tremulous +love, when they hovered on the edge of the precipice. They had been +hurled over it since then. It was some relief that between love and +honour he would not have to struggle any longer. + +And Kate? When all was over and word went round, “The Deemster is gone,” + what would happen to Kate? She would still be at his house in Athol +Street. That would be the beginning of evil! She would wait for him, and +when hope of his return was lost, she would weep for him. That would be +the key of discovery! The truth would become known. Though he might be +at the bottom of the sea, yet the cloud that hung over his life would +break. It was inevitable. And she would be there to bear the storm +alone--alone with the island which had been deceived, alone with Pete, +who had been lied to and betrayed. Was that just? Was that brave? + +And then--what then? What would become of her? Openly shamed, charged, +as she must be, with the whole weight of the crime from whose burden +he had fled, accused of his downfall, a Delilah, a Jezebel, what fate +should befall her? Where would she go? Down to what depths? He saw +her sinking lower than ever man sinks; he heard her appeals, her +supplications. + +“Oh, what have I done,” he cried, “that I can neither live nor die?” + +Then in that delirium of anguish in which the order of nature is +reversed, and external objects no longer produce sensation, but +sensation produces, as it were, external objects, he thought he saw +something at the bottom of the boat where the broken rose had been. It +was the figure of a man, stretched out, still and lifeless. His eyes +went up to the face. The face was his own. It was ashy grey, and it +stared up at the grey sky. The brain image was himself, and he was +dead. He watched it, and it faded away. There was nothing left but the +scattered rose-leaves and the torn flower on the broken stem. + +The terrible shadow was gone; he felt that it was gone for ever. It was +dead, and it would haunt him no longer. It had lived on an empire of +evil-doing, and his evil-doing was at an end. He would “see his soul” no +more. The tears gushed to his eyes and blinded him. They were the first +he could remember since he was a boy. Alone between the two mirrors of +sea and sky, the chain that he had dragged so long fell: away from him. +He was a free man again. + +“Go back! your place is by her side. Don't sneak out of life, and leave +another to pay. Suffering is a grand thing. It is the struggle of the +soul to cast off its sin. Accept it, go through with it, come out of it +purged. Go back to the island. Your life is not ended yet.” + + + + +XXIV. + +“We were just going sending a lil yawl after you, Dempster, when we were +seeing you a bit overside the head yonder coming back. 'He's drifting +home on the flowing tide,' says I, and so you were. Must have been a +middling stiff pull for all. We were thinking you were lost one while +there.” + +“I _was_ almost lost, but I'm here again, thank God,” said Philip. + +He spoke cheerily, and went away with a light step. It was now full +night; the town was lit up, and the musicians of the pavement were +twanging their banjos and harps. Philip felt a sort of physical +regeneration, a renewal of youth, a new birth of heart and hope. He was +like a man coming out of some hideous Gehenna of delirious illness; +he though he had never been so light, so buoyant, so happy in his life +before. The future was vague. He did not yet know what he would do. It +would be something radical, something that would go down to the heart +of his condition. Oh, he would be strong, he would be resolute, he would +pay the uttermost farthing, he would not wait to count the cost. And +she--she would be with him. He could do nothing without her. The partner +of his fault would share his redemption also. God bless her! + +He let himself into the house and shut the door firmly behind him. +The lights were still burning in the hall, so it was not very late. He +mounted the stairs with a loud step and swung into his room. The lamp +was on the table, and within the circle cast by its blue shade a letter +was lying. He took it up with dismay. It was in Kate's handwriting:-- + +“Forgive me! I am going away. It is all my fault. I have broken the +heart of one man, and I am destroying the soul of another. If I stay +here any longer you will be ruined and lost. I am only a millstone about +your neck. I see it, I feel it. And yet I have loved you so, and wished +to be so proud of you. Your heart is brave enough, though I have sunk it +down so low. You will live to be strong and good and true, though that +can never be while I am with you. I have been far below you from the +first. All along I have only been thinking how much I loved you, but you +have had so many other things to consider. My life seems to have been +one long battle for love. I think it has been a cruel battle too. +Anyway, I am beaten, and oh! so tired. + +“Do not follow me. I pray of you do not try to find me. It is my last +request. Think of me as on a long journey. I may be--the Great God of +heaven knows. + +“I am taking the little cracked medallion from the bottom of the oak +box. It is the only picture I can find, and it will remind me of some +one else as well--my little Katherine, my motherless baby. + +“I have nothing to leave with you but this (_it was a lock of her +hair_). At first I thought of the wedding-ring that you gave me when I +came here, but it would not come off, and besides, I could not part with +it. + +“Good-bye! I ought to have done this long ago. But you will not hate me +now? We could never be happy together again. Good-bye!” + + + + +PART VI. MAN AND GOD. + + + + +I. + +The summer had gone, the gorse had dried up, the herring-fishing had +ended, and Pete had become poor. His Nickey had done nothing, his last +hundred pounds had been spent, and his creditors in scores, quiet as +mice until then, were baying about him like bloodhounds. He sold his +boat and satisfied everybody, but fell, nevertheless, to the position of +a person of no credit and little consequence. On the lips of the people +he descended from “Capt'n Pete” to Peter Bridget. When he saluted the +rich with “How do!” they replied with a stare, a lift of the chin, and +“You've the odds of me, my good man.” To this he replied, with a roll of +the head and a peal of laughter, “Have I now? But you'll die for all.” + +Ballajora Chapel had been three months rehearsing a children's cantata +entitled “Under the Palms,” and building an arbour of palm branches on +a platform for Pete's rugged form to figure in; but Cæsar sat there +instead. + +Still, Pete had his six thousand pounds in mortgage on Ballawhaine. +Only three other persons knew anything of that--Cæsar, who had his own +reasons for saying nothing; Peter Christian himself, who was hardly +likely to tell; and the High Bailiff, who was a bachelor and a miser, +and kept all business revelations as sacred as are the secrets of +another kind of confessional. When Pete's evil day came and the world +showed no pity, Cæsar became afraid. + +“I wouldn't sell out, sir,” said he. “Hould on till Martinmas, anyway. +The first half year's interest is due then. There's no knowing what'll +happen before that. What's it saying, 'He shall give His angels charge +concerning thee.' The ould man has had a polatic stroke, they're telling +me. Aw, the Lord's mercy endureth for ever.” + +Pete began to sell his furniture. He cleared out the parlour as bare as +a vault. “Time for it, too,” he said. “I've been wanting the room for a +workshop.” + +Martinmas came, and Cæsar returned in high feather. “No interest,” he +said. “Give him the month's grace, and hould hard till it's over. +The Lord will provide. Isn't it written, 'In the world ye shall have +tribulation'? Things are doing wonderful, though. Last night going home +from Ballajora, I saw the corpse-lights coming from the big house to +Kirk Christ's Churchyard, with the parson psalming in front of them. The +ould man's dying---I've seen his soul. To thy name, O Lord, be all the +glory.” + +Pete sold out a second room, and turned the key on it. “Mortal cosy and +small this big, ugly mansion is getting, Nancy,” he said. + +The month's grace allowed by the deed of mortgage expired, and Cæsar +came to Elm Cottage rubbing both hands. “Turn him out, neck and crop, +sir. Not a penny left to the man, and six thousand goolden pounds paid +into his hands seven months ago. But who's wondering at that? There's +Ross back again, carrying half a ton of his friends over the island, +and lashing out the silver like dust. _Your_ silver, sir, _yours_. And +here's yourself, with the world darkening round you terrible. But no +fear of you now. The meek shall inherit the earth. Aw, God is opening +His word more and more, sir, more and more. There's that Black Tom too. +He was talking big a piece back, but this morning he was up before +the High Bailiff for charming and cheating, and was put away for the +Dempster. Lord keep him from the gallows and hell-fire! Oh, it's a +refreshing saison. It was God spaking to me by Providence when I tould +you to put money on that mortgage. What's the Scripture saying, 'For +brass I bring thee goold'? Turn him out, sir, turn him out.” + +“Didn't you tell me that ould Ballawhaine had a polatic stroke?” said +Pete. + +“I did; but he's a big man; let him pay his way,” said Cæsar. + +“Samson was a strong man, and Solomon was a wise one, but they couldn't +pay money when they hadn't got it,” said Pete. + +“Let him look to his son then,” said Cæsar”. + +“That's just what he's going to do,” said Pete. “I'll let him die in his +bed, God forgive him.” + +The winter came, and Pete began to think of buying a Dandie, which being +smaller than a Nickey, and of yawl rig, he could sail of himself, and so +earn a living by fishing the cod. To do this he had a further clearing +of furniture, thereby reducing the size of the house to three rooms. The +featherbed left his own bedstead, the watch came out of his pocket, and +the walls of the hall-kitchen gaped and yawned in the places where the +pictures had been. + +“The bog-bane to the rushy curragh, say I, Nancy,” said Pete. “Not being +used of such grandeur, I was taking it hard. Never could remember to +wind that watch. And feathers, bless you! Don't I remember the lil +mother, with a sickle and a bag, going cutting the long grass on the +steep brews for the cow, and drying a handful for myself for a bed. +Sleeping on it? Never slept the like since at all.” + +The result of Pete's first week's fishing was twenty cod and a +gigantic ling. He packed the cod in boxes and sent them by Crow and the +steam-packet to the market in Liverpool. The ling he swung on his back +over his oilskin jacket and carried it home, the head at his shoulder +and the tail dangling at his legs. + +“There!” he cried, dropping it on the floor, “split it and salt it, and +you've breakfas'es for a month.” + +When the remittance came from Liverpool it was a postal order for +seven-and-sixpence. + +“Never mind,” said Pete; “we're bating Dan Hommy anyway--the ould muff +has only made seven-and-a-penny.” + +The weather was rough, the fishing was bad, the tackle got broken, and +Pete began to extol plain living. + +“Gough bless me,” he said, “I don't know in the world what's coming +to the ould island at all. When I was for a man-servant with Cæsar the +farming boys were ateing potatoes and herrings three times a day. But +now! butcher's mate every dinner-time, if you plaze. And tay! the girls +must be having it reg'lar--and taking no shame with them neither. My +sake, I remember when the mother would be whispering, 'Keep an eye on +the road, boy, while I'm brewing myself a cup of tay.' Truth enough, +Nancy. An ounce a week and a pound of sugar, and people wondering at the +woman for that.” + +The mountains were taken from the people, and they were no longer +allowed “to cut turf for fuel; coals were dear, the winter was cold, and +Pete began to complain of a loss of appetite. + +“My teeth must be getting bad, Nancy,” he whined. They were white as +milk and faultless as a negro's. “Don't domesticate my food somehow. +What's the odds, though I Can't ate suppers at all, and that's some +constilation. Nothing like going to bed hungry, Nancy, if you're wanting +to get up with an appetite for breakfast. Then the beautiful drames, +woman! Gough bless me, the dinners and the feasts and the bankets you're +ateing in your sleep! Now, if you filled your skin like a High Bailiff +afore going to bed, ten to one you'd have a buggane riding on your +breast the night through and drame of dying for a drink of water. Aw, +sleep's a reg'lar Radical Good for levelling up, anyway.” + +Christmas approached, servants boasted of the Christmas boxes they got +from their masters, and Pete remembered Nancy. + +“Nancy,” said he, “they're telling me Liza Billy-ny-Clae is getting +twenty pound per year per annum at her new situation in Douglas. She +isn't nothing to yourself at cooking. Mustn't let the lil one stand in +your way, woman. She's getting a big girl now, and I'll be taking her +out in the Dandie with me and tying her down on the low deck there and +giving her a pig's bladder, and she'll be playing away as nice as nice. +See?” + +Nancy looked at him, and he dropped his eyes before her. + +“Is it wanting to get done with me, you are, Pete?” she said in a +quavering voice. “There's my black--I can sell it for something--it's +never been wore at me since I sat through the sarvice with Grannie the +Sunday after we got news of Kirry. And I'm not a big eater, Pete--never +was--you can clear me of that anyway. A bit of bread and cheese for my +dinner when you are out at the fishing, and I'm asking no better----” + +“Hould your tongue, woman,” cried Pete. “Hould your tongue afore you +break my heart I've seen my rich days and I've seen my poor days. I've +tried both, and I'm content.” + + + + +II. + +Meantime, Philip in Douglas was going from success to success, from rank +to rank, from fame to fame. Everything he put his hand to counted to him +for righteousness. When he came to himself after the disappearance of +Kate, his heart was a wasted field of volcanic action, with ashes and +scoriae of infernal blackness on the surface, but the wholesome soil +beneath. In spite of her injunction, he set himself to look for her. +More than love, more than pity, more than remorse prompted and supported +him. She was necessary to his resurrection, to his new birth. So he +scoured every poor quarter of the town, every rookery of old Douglas, +and this was set down to an interest in the poor. + +An epidemic broke out on the island, and during the scare that followed, +wherein some of the wealthy left their homes for England, and many of +the poor betook themselves to the mountains, and even certain of the +doctors found refuge in flight, Philip won golden opinions for presence +of mind and personal courage. He organised a system of registration, +regulated quarantine, and caused the examination of everybody coming to +the island or leaving it. From day to day he went from house to house, +from hospital to hospital, from ward to ward. No dangers terrified him; +he seemed to keep his eye on each case. He was only looking for Kate, +only assuring himself that she had not fallen victim to the pest, only +making certain that she had not come or gone. But the divine madness +which seizes upon a crowd when its heart is touched laid hold of the +island at the sight of Philip's activities. He was worshipped, he +was beloved, he was the idol of the poor, almost everybody else was +forgotten in the splendour of his fame; no committee could proceed +without him; no list was complete until it included his name. + +Philip was ashamed of his glories, but he had no heart to repudiate +them. When the epidemic subsided, he had convinced himself that Kate +must be gone, that she must be dead. Gone, therefore, was his only hold +on life, and dead was his hope of a moral resurrection. He could do +nothing without her but go on as he was going. To pretend to a new birth +now would be like a death-bed conversion; it would be like renouncing +the joys of life after they have renounced the renouncer. + +His colleague, the old Deemster, was stricken down by paralysis, and he +was required to attend to both their duties. This made it necessary at +first that all Deemster's Courts should be held in Castletown, and +hence Ramsey saw him rarely. He spent his days in the Court-house of the +Castle and his nights at home. His fair hair became prematurely white, +and his face grew more than ever like that of a man newly risen from a +fever. + +“Study,” said the world, and it bowed its head the lower. + +Yet he was seen to be not only a studious man, but a melancholy one. +To defeat curiosity, he began to enter a little into the life of the +island, and, as time went on, to engage in some of the social duties of +his official position. On Christmas Eve he gave a reception at his +house in Athol Street. He had hardly realised how it would tear at the +tenderest fibres of memory. The very rooms that had been Kate's were +given over to the ladies who were his guests. All afternoon the crush +was great, and the host was the attraction. He was a fascinating +figure--so young, yet already so high; so silent, yet able to speak +so splendidly; and then so handsome with that whitening head, and that +smile like vanishing sunshine. + +In the midst of the reception, Philip received a letter from Ramsey that +was like the cry of a bleeding heart:-- + +“My lil one is ill theyr sayin shes Diein cum to me for gods. +sake.--Peat.” + +The snow was beginning to fall as the guests departed. When the last of +them was gone, the clock on the bureau was striking six, and the night +was closing in. By eight o'clock Philip was at Elm Cottage. + + + + +III. + +Pete was sitting at the foot of the stairs, unwashed, uncombed, with his +clothes half buttoned and his shoes unlaced. + +“Phil!” he cried, and leaping up he took Philip by both hands and fell +to sobbing like a child. + +They went upstairs together. The bedroom was dense with steam, and the +forms of two women were floating like figures in a fog. + +“There she is, the bogh,” cried Pete in a pitiful wail. + +The child lay outstretched on Grannie's lap, with no sign of +consciousness, and hardly any sign of life, except the hollow breathing +of bronchitis. + +Philip felt a strange emotion come over him. He sat on the end of the +bed and looked down. The little face, with its twitching mouth and +pinched nostrils, beating with every breath, was the face of Kate. The +little head, with its round forehead and the silvery hair brushed back +from the temples, was his own head. A mysterious throb surprised him, a +great tenderness, a deep yearning, something new to him, and born as +it were in his breast at that instant. He had an impulse, never felt +before, to go down on his knees where the child lay, to take it in his +arms, to draw it to him, to fondle it, to call it his own, and to pour +over it the inarticulate babble of pain and love that was bursting from +his tongue. But some one was kneeling there already, and in his jealous +longing he realised that his passionate sorrow could have no voice. + +Pete, at Grannie's lap, was stroking the child's arm and her forehead +with the tenderness of a woman. + +“The bogh millish! Seems aisier now, doesn't she, Grannie? Quieter, +anyway? Not coughing so much, is she?” + +The doctor came at the moment, and Cæsar entered the room behind him +with a face of funereal resignation. + +“See,” cried Pete; “there's your lil patient, doctor. She's lying as +quiet as quiet, and hasn't coughed to spake of for better than an hour.” + +“H'm!” said the doctor ominously. He looked at the child, made some +inquiries of Grannie, gave certain instructions to Nancy, and then +lifted his head with a sigh. + +“Well, we've done all we can for her,” he said. “If the child lives +through the night she may get over it.” + +The women threw up their hands with “Aw, dear, aw, dear!” Philip gave +a low, sharp cry of pain; but Pete, who had been breathing heavily, +watching intently, and holding his arms about the little one as if he +would save it from disease and death and heaven itself, now lost himself +in the immensity of his woe. + +“Tut, doctor, what are you saying?” he said. “You were always took for a +knowledgable man, doctor; but you're talking nonsense now. Don't you see +the child's only sleeping comfortable? And haven't I told you she hasn't +coughed anything worth for an hour? Do you think a poor fellow's got no +sense at all?” + +The doctor was a patient man as well as a wise one--he left the room +without a word. But, thinking to pour oil on Pete's wounds, and not +minding that his oil was vitriol, Cæsar said-- + +“If it's the Lord's will, it's His will, sir. The sins of the fathers +are visited upon the children--yes, and the mothers, too, God forgive +them.” + +At that Pete leapt to his feet in a flame of wrath. + +“You lie! you lie!” he cried. “God doesn't punish the innocent for the +guilty. If He does, He's not a good God but a bad one. Why should this +child be made to suffer and die for the sin of its mother? Aye, or its +father either? Show me the _man_ that would make it do the like, and +I'll smash his head against the wall. Blaspheming, am I? No, but it's +you that's blaspheming. God is good, God is just, God is in heaven, and +you are making Him out no God at all, but worse than the blackest devil +that's in hell.” + +Cæsar went off in horror of Pete's profanities. “If the Lord keep not +the city,” he said, “the watchman waketh in vain.” + +Pete's loud voice had aroused the child. It made a little cry, and +he was all softness in an instant. The women moistened its lips with +barley-water, and hushed its fretful whimper. + +“Come,” said Philip, taking Pete's arm. + +“Let me lean on you, Philip,” said Pete, and the stalwart fellow went +tottering down the stairs. + +They sat on opposite sides of the fireplace, and kept the staircase door +open that they might hear all that happened in the room above. + +“Get thee to bed, Nancy,” said the voice of Grannie. “Dear knows how +soon you'll be wanted.” + +“You'll be calling me for twelve, then, Grannie--now, mind, you'll be +calling me.” + +“Poor Pete! He's not so far wrong, though. What's it saying? 'Suffer lil +childers'----” + +“But Cæsar's right enough this time, Grannie. The bogh is took for death +as sure as sure. I saw the crow that was at the wedding going crossing +the child's head the very last time she was out of doors.” Pete was +listening intently. Philip was gazing passively into the fire. + +“I couldn't help it, sir--I couldn't really,” whispered Pete across the +hearth. “When a man's got a child that's ill, they may talk about saving +souls, but what's the constilation in that? It's not the soul he's +wanting saving at all, it's the child--now, isn't it, now?” + +Philip made some confused response. + +“Coorse, I can't expect you to understand that, Philip. You're a grand +man, and a clever man, and a feeling man, but I can't expect you to +understand that--now, is it likely? The greenest gall's egg of a father +that isn't half wise has the pull of you there, Phil. 'Deed he has, +though. When a man has a child of his own he's knowing what it manes, +the Lord help him. Something calls to him--it's like blood calling +to blood--it's like... I don't know that I'm understanding it myself, +neither--not to say _understand_ exactly.” + +Every word that Pete spoke was like a sword turning both ways. Philip +drew his breath heavily. + +“You can feel for another, Phil--the Lord forbid you should ever feel +for yourself. Books are _your_ children, and they're best off that's +never having no better. But the lil ones--God help them--to see +them fail, and suffer, and sink--and you not able to do nothing--and +themselves calling to you--calling still--calling reg'lar--calling out +of mercy--the way I am telling of, any way--O God! O God!” + +Philip's throat rose. He felt as if he must betray himself the next +instant. + +“Perhaps the doctor was right for all. Maybe the child isn't willing +to stay with us now the mother is gone; maybe it's wanting away, poor +thing. And who knows? Wouldn't trust but the mother is waiting for the +lil bogh yonder--waiting and waiting on the shore there, and 'ticing and +'ticing---I've heard of the like, anyway.” + +Philip groaned. His brain reeled; his legs grew cold as stones. A great +awe came over him. It was not Pete alone that he was encountering. +In these searchings and rendings of the heart, which uncovered every +thought and tore open every wound, he was entering the lists with God +himself. + +The church bell began to ring. + +“What's that?” cried Philip. It had struck upon his ear like a knell. + +“_Oiel Verree_,” said Pete. The bell was ringing for the old Manx +service for the singing of Christmas carols. The fibres of Pete's memory +were touched by it. He told of his Christmases abroad--how it was summer +instead of winter, and fruits were on the trees instead of snow on the +ground--how people who had never spoken to him before would shake hands +and wish him a merry Christmas. Then from sheer weariness and a sense +of utter desolation, broken by the comfort of Philip's company, he fell +asleep in his chair. + +The night wore on; the house was quiet; only the husky rasping of the +child's hurried breathing came from the floor above. + +An evil thought in the guise of a pious one took possession of Philip. +“God is wise,” he told himself. “God is merciful. He knows what is best +for all of us. What are we poor impotent grasshoppers, that we dare pray +to Him to change His great purposes? It is idle. It is impious.... While +the child lives there will be security for no one. If it dies, there +will be peace and rest and the beginning of content. The mother must be +gone already, so the dark chapter of our lives will be closed at last +God is all wise. God is all good.” + +The child made a feeble cry, and Philip crept upstairs to look. Grannie +had dozed off in her seat, and little Katherine was on the bed. A +disregarded doll lay with inverted head on the counterpane. The fire +had slid and died down to a lifeless glow, and the kettle had ceased +to steam. There was no noise in the room save the child's galloping +breathing, which seemed to scrape the walls as with a file. Sometimes +there was a cough that came like a voice through a fog. + +Philip crept in noiselessly, knelt down by the bed-head, and leaned over +the pillow. A candle which burned on the mantelpiece cast its light on +the head that lay there. The little face was drawn, the little pinched +nostrils were beating like a pulse, the little lip beneath was beaded +with perspiration, the beautiful round forehead was damp, and the silken +silvery hair was matted. + +Philip thought the child must be dying, and his ugly piety gave way. +There was a movement on the bed. One little hand that had been clenched +hard on the breast came over the counterpane and fell, outstretched and +open before him. He took it for an appeal, a dumb and piteous appeal, +and the smothered tenderness of the father's heart came uppermost. _Her_ +child, his child, dying, and he there, yet not daring to claim her! + +A new fear took hold of him. He had been wrong--there could be no +security in the child's death, no peace, no rest, no content. As surely +as the child died he would betray himself. He would blurt it all out; he +would tell everything. “My child! my darling! my Kate's Kate!” The cry +would burst from him. He could not help it. And to reveal the black +secret at the mouth of an open grave would be terrible, it would be +horrible, it would be awful, “Spare her, O Lord, spare her!” + +In a fear bordering on delirium he went downstairs and shook Pete by the +shoulders to awaken him. “Come quickly,” he said. + +Pete opened his eyes with a bewildered look» “She's better, isn't she?” + he asked. + +“Courage,” said Philip. + +“Is she worse?” + +“It's life or death now. We must try something that I saw when I was +away.” + +“Good Lord, and I've been sleeping! Save her, Philip! You're great; your +clever----” + +“Be quiet, for God's sake, my good fellow! Quick, a kettle of boiling +water--a blanket--some hot towels.” + +“Oh, you're a friend, you'll save her. The doctors don't know nothing.” + +Ten minutes afterwards the child made a feeble cry, coughed loosely, +threw up phlegm, and came out of the drowsy land which it had inhabited +for a week. In ten minutes more it was wrapped in the hot towels and +sitting on Pete's knee before a brisk are, opening its little eyes and +pursing its little mouth, and making some inarticulate communication. + +Then Grannie awoke with a start, and reproached herself for sleeping. +“But dear heart alive,” she cried, with both hands up, “the bogh villish +is mended wonderful.” + +Nancy came back in her stockings, blinking and yawning. She clapped and +crowed at sight of the child's altered face. The clock in the kitchen +was striking twelve by this time, the bells had begun to ring again, the +carol singers were coming out of the church, there was a sound on the +light snow of the street like the running of a shallow river, and the +waits were being sung for the dawn of another Christmas. + +The doctor looked in on his way home, and congratulated himself on the +improved condition. The crisis was passed, the child was safe. + +“Ah! better, better,” he said cheerily. “I thought we might manage it +this time.” + +“It was the Dempster that done it,” cried Pete. He was cooing and +blowing at little Katherine over the fringe of her towels. “He couldn't +have done more for the lil one if she'd been his own flesh and blood.” + +Philip dared not speak. He hurried away in a storm of emotion. “Not +yet,” he thought, “not yet.” The time of his discovery was not yet. It +was like Death, though--it waited for him somewhere. Somewhere and at +some time--some day in the year, some place on the earth. Perhaps his +eyes knew the date in the calendar, perhaps his feet knew the spot on +the land, yet he knew neither. Somewhere and at some time--God knew +where--God knew when--He kept his own secrets. + +That night Philip slept at the “Mitre,” and next morning he went up to +Ballure. + + + + +IV. + +The Governor could not forget Tynwald. Exaggerating the humiliation of +that day, he thought his influence in the island was gone. He sold his +horses and carriages, and otherwise behaved like a man who expected to +be recalled. + +Towards Philip he showed no malice. It was not merely as the author of +his shame that Philip had disappointed him. + +He had half cherished a hope that Philip would become his son-in-law. +But when the rod in his hand had failed him, when it proved too big +for a staff and too rough for a crutch, he did not attempt to break it. +Either from the instinct of a gentleman, or the pride of a strong man, +he continued to shower his favours upon Philip. Going to London with his +wife and daughter at the beginning of the new year, he appointed Philip +to act as his deputy. + +Philip did not abuse his powers. As grandson of the one great Manxman +of his century, and himself a man of talents, he was readily accepted by +the island. His only drawback was his settled melancholy. This added to +his interest if it took from his popularity. The ladies began to whisper +that he had fallen in love, and that his heart was “buried in the +grave.” He did not forget old comrades. It was remembered, in his +favour, that one of his friends was a fisherman, a cousin across the bar +of bastardy, who had been a fool and gone through his fortune. + +On St. Bridget's Day Philip held Deemster's Court in Ramsey. The snow +had gone and the earth had the smell of violets. It was almost as if the +violets themselves lay close beneath the soil, and their odour had been +too long kept under. The sun, which had not been seen for weeks, had +burst out that day; the air was warm, and the sky was blue. Inside the +Court-house the upper arcs of the windows had been let down; the sun +shone on the Deemster as he sat on the dais, and the spring breeze +played with his silvery wig. Some^ times, in the pauses of rasping +voices, the birds were heard to sing from the trees on the lawn outside. + +The trial was a tedious and protracted one. It was the trial of Black +Tom. During the epidemic that had visited the island he had developed +the character of a witch doctor. His first appearance in Court had been +before the High Bailiff, who had committed him to prison. He had been +bailed out by Pete, and had forfeited his bail in an attempt at flight. +The witnesses were now many, and some came from a long distance. It was +desirable to conclude the same day. At five in the evening the Deemster +rose and said, “The Court will adjourn for an hour, gentlemen.” + +Philip took his own refreshments in the Deemster's room--Jem-y-Lord +was with him--then put off his wig and gown, and slipped through the +prisoners' yard at the back and round the corner to Elm Cottage. + +It was now quite dark. The house was lit by the firelight only, which +flashed like Will-o'-the-wisp on the hall window. Philip was surprised +by unusual sounds. There was laughter within, then singing, and then +laughter again. He bad reached the porch and his approach had not been +heard. The door stood open and he looked in and listened. + +The room was barer than he had ever seen it--a table, three chairs, a +cradle, a dresser, and a corner cupboard. Nancy sat by the fire with the +child on her lap. Pete was squatting on the floor, which was strewn with +rushes, and singing-- + + “Come, Bridget, Saint Bridget, come in at my door, + The crock's on the bink, and the rush is on the floor.” + +Then getting on to all fours like a great boy, and bobbing his head up +and down and making deep growls to imitate the terrors of a wild beast, +he made little runs and plunges at the child, who jumped and crowed in +Nancy's lap and laughed and squealed till she “kinked.” + +“Now, stop, you great omathaun, stop,” said Nancy. “It isn't good for +the lil one--'deed it isn't.” + +But Pete was too greedy of the child's joy to deny himself the delight +of it. Making a great low sweep of the room, he came back hopping on +his haunches and barking like a dog. Then the child laughed till the +laughter rolled like a marble in her little throat. + +Philip's own throat rose at the sight, and his breast began to ache. He +felt the same thrill as before--the same, yet different, more painful, +more full of jealous longing. This was no place for him. He thought he +would go away. But turning on his heel, he was seen by Pete, who was now +on his back on the floor, rocking the child up and down like the bellows +of an accordion, and to and fro like the sleigh of a loom. + +“My faith, the Dempster! Come in, sir, come in,” cried Pete, looking +over his forehead. Then, giving the child back to Nancy, he leapt to his +feet. + +Philip entered with a sick yearning and sat down in the chair facing +Nancy. + +“You're wondering at me, Dempster, I know you are, sir,” Said Pete, +“'Deed, but I'm wondering at myself as well. I thought I was never going +to see a glad day again, and if the sky would ever be blue I would be +breaking my heart. But what is the Manx poet saying, sir? 'I have no +will but Thine, O God.' That's me, sir, truth enough, and since the lil +one has been mending I've never been so happy in my life.” + +Philip muttered some commonplace, and put his thumb into the baby's +hand. It was sucked in by the little fingers as by the soft feelers of +the sea-anemone. + +Pete drew up the third chair, and then all interest was centred on the +child. “She's growing,” said Philip huskily. + +“And getting wise ter'ble,” said Pete. “You wouldn't be-lave it, sir, +but that child's got the head of an almanac. She has, though. Listen +here, sir--what does the cow say, darling?” + +“Moo-o,” said the little one. + +“Look at that now!” said Pete rapturously. + +“She knows what the dog says too,” said Nancy. “What does Dempster +say, bogh?” + +“Bow-wow,” said the child. + +“Bless me soul!” said Pete, turning to Philip with amazement at the +child's supernatural wisdom. “And there's Tom Hommy's boy--and a fine +lil fellow enough for all--but six weeks older than this one, and not a +word out of him yet.” + +Hearing himself talked of, the dog had come from under the table. The +child gurgled down at it, then made purring noises at its own feet, and +wriggled in Nancy's lap. + +“Dear heart alive, if it's not like nursing an eel,” said Nancy. “Be +quiet, will you?” and the little one was shaken back to her seat. + +“Aisy all, woman,” said Pete. “She's just wanting her lil shoes +and stockings off, that's it.” Then talking to the child. +“Um--am-im--lum--la--loo? Just so! I don't know what that means +myself, but she does, you see. Aw, the child is taiching me heaps, sir. +Listening to the lil one I'm remembering things. Well, we're only big +children, the best of us. That's the way the world's keeping young, and +God help it when we're getting so clever there's no child left in us at +all.” + +“Time for young women to be in bed, though,” said Nancy, getting up to +give the baby her bath. + +“Let me have a hould of the rogue first,” said Pete, and as Nancy took +the child out of the room, he dragged at it and smothered its open mouth +with kisses. + +“Poor sport for you, sir, watching a foolish ould father playing games +with his lil one,” said Pete. + +Philip's answer was broken and confused. His eyes had begun to fill, and +to hide them he turned his head aside. Thinking he was looking at the +empty places about the walls, Pete began to enlarge on his prosperity, +and to talk as if he were driving all the trade of the island before +him. + +“Wonderful fishing now, Phil. I'm exporting a power of cod. Gretting +postal orders and stamps, and I don't know what. Seven-and-sixpence in a +single post from Liverpool--that's nothing, sir, nothing at all.” + +Nancy brought back the child, whose silvery curls were now damp. + +“What! a young lady coming in her night-dress!” cried Pete. + +“Work enough! had to get it over her head, too,” said Nancy. “She +wouldn't, no, she wouldn't. Here, take and dry her hair by the fire +while I warm up her supper.” + +Pete rolled the sleeves of his jersey above his elbows, took the child +on his knee, and rubbed her hair between his hands, singing-- + + “Come, Bridget, Saint Bridget, come in at my door.” + +Nancy clattered about in her clogs, filled a saucepan with bread and +milk, and brought it to the fire. + +“Give it to me, Nancy,” said Philip, and he leaned over and held the +saucepan above the bar. The child watched him intently. + +“Well, did you ever?” said Pete. “The strange she's making of you, +Philip? Don't you know the gentleman, darling? Aw, but he's knowing you, +though.” + +The saucepan boiled, and Philip handed it back to Nancy. + +“Go to him then--away with you,” said Pete. “Gro to your godfather. He'd +have been your name-father too if it had been a boy you'd been. Off you +go!” and he stretched out his hairy arms until the child touched the +floor. + +Philip stooped to take the little one, who first pranced and beat the +rushes with its feet as with two drumsticks, then trod on its own +legs, swirled about to Pete's arms, dropped its lower lip, and set up a +terrified outcry. + +“Ah! she knows her own father, bless her,” cried Pete, plucking the +child back to his breast. + +Philip dropped his head and laughed. A sort of creeping fear had taken +possession of him, as if he felt remotely that the child was to be the +channel of his retribution. + +“Will you feed her yourself, Pete?” said Nancy. She was coming up with +a saucer, of which she was tasting the contents. “He's that handy with +a child, sir, you wouldn't think 'Deed you wouldn't.” Then, stooping to +the baby as it ate its supper, “But I'm saying, young woman, is there no +sleep in your eyes to-night?” + +“No, but nodding away here like a wood-thrush in a tree,” said Pete. He +was ladling the pobs into the child's mouth, and scooping the overflow +from her chin. “Sleep's a terrible enemy of this one, sir. She's having +a battle with it every night of life, anyway. God help her, she'll have +luck better than some of us, or she'll be fighting it the other way +about one of these days.” + +“She's us'ally going off with the spoon in her mouth, sir, for all the +world like a lil cherub,” said Nancy. + +“Too busy looking at her godfather to-night, though,” said Pete. “Well, +look at him. You owe him your life, you lil sandpiper. And, my sakes, +the straight like him you are, too!” + +“Isn't she?” said Nancy. “If I wasn't thinking the same myself! Couldn't +look straighter like him if she'd been his born child; now, could she? +And the curls, too, and the eyes! Well, well!” + +“If she'd been a boy, now----” began Pete. + +But Philip had risen to return to the Court-house, and Pete said in +another tone, “Hould hard a minute, sir--I've something to show you. +Here, take the lil one, Nancy.” + +Pete lit a candle and led the way into the parlour. The room was empty +of furniture; but at one end there was a stool, a stone mason's mallet, +a few chisels, and a large stone. + +The stone was a gravestone. + +Pete approached it solemnly, held up the candle in front of it, and said +in a low voice, “It's for her. I've been doing it myself, sir, and it's +lasted me all winter, dark nights and bad days. I'll be finishing it +to-night, though, God willing, and to-morrow, maybe, I'll be taking it +to Douglas.” + +“Is it----” began Philip, but he could not finish. + +The stone was a plain slab, rounded at the top, bevelled about the edge, +smoothed on the face, and chiselled over the back; but there was no sign +or symbol on it, and no lettering or inscription. + +“Is there to be no name?” asked Philip at last. + +“No,” said Pete. + +“No?” + +“Tell you the truth, sir, I've been reading what it's saying in the ould +Book about the Recording Angel calling the dead out of their graves.” + +“Yes?” + +“And I've been thinking the way he'll be doing it will be going to the +graveyards and seeing the names on the gravestones, and calling them out +loud to rise up to judgment; some, as it's saying, to life eternal, and +some to everlasting punishment.” + +“Well?” + +“Well, sir, I've been thinking if he comes to this one and sees no name +on it”--Pete's voice sank to a whisper--“maybe he'll pass it by and let +the poor sinner sleep on.” + +Stumbling back to the Court-house through the dark lane Philip thought, +“It was a lie _then_, but it's true _now_. It _must_ be true. She must +be dead.” There was a sort of relief in this certainty. It was an end, +at all events; a pitiful end, a cowardly end, a kind of sneaking out of +Fate's fingers; it was not what he had looked for and intended, but he +struggled to reconcile himself to it. + +Then he remembered the child and thought, “Why should I disturb it? Why +should I disturb Pete? I will watch over it all its life. I will protect +it and find a way to provide for it. I will do my duty by it. The child +shall never want.” + +He was offering the key to the lock of the prisoners' yard when some +one passed him in the lane, peered into his face, then turned about and +spoke. + +“Oh, it's you, Deemster Christian?” + +“Yes, doctor. Good-night!” + +“Have you heard the news from Ballawhaine? The old gentleman had another +stroke this morning.” + +“No, I had not heard it. Another? Dear me, dear me!” + +Back in his room, Philip resumed his wig and gown and returned to +the Court-house. The place was now lit up by candlelight and densely +crowded. Everybody rose to his feet as the Deemster stepped to the dais. + + + + +V. + + “Come, Bridget, Saint Bridget, come in at my door, + The crock's on the bink and the rush----” + +“She's fast,” said Nancy. “Rocking this one to sleep is like waiting for +the kettle to boil. You may try and try, and blow and blow, but never a +sound. And no sooner have you forgotten all about her, but she's singing +away as steady as a top.” + +Nancy put the child into the cradle, tucked her about, twisted the head +of the little nest so that the warmth of the fire should enter it, and +hung a shawl over the hood to protect the little eyelids from the light. +“Will you keep the house till I'm home from Sulby, Pete?” + +“I've my work, woman,” said Pete from the parlour. + +“I'll put a junk on the fire and be off then,” said Nancy. + +She pulled the door on to the catch behind her and went crunching the +gravel to the gate. There was no sound in the house now but the +gentle breathing of the sleeping child, soft as an angel's prayer, the +chirruping of the mended fire like a cage of birds, the ticking of the +clock, and, through the parlour wall, the dull pat-put, pat-put of the +wooden mallet and the scrape of the chisel on the stone. + +Pete worked steadily for half an hour, and then came back to the +hall-kitchen with his tools in his hands. The cob of coal had kindled to +a lively flame, which flashed and went out, and the quick black shadows +of the chairs and the table and the jugs on the dresser were leaping +about the room like elves. With parted lips, just breaking into a smile, +Pete went down on one knee by the cradle, put the mallet under his arm, +and gently raised the shawl curtain. “God bless my motherless girl,” + he said, in a voice no louder than a breath. Suddenly, while he knelt +there, he was smitten as by an electric shock. His face straightened and +he drew back, still holding the shawl at the tips of his fingers. + +The child was sleeping peacefully, with one of its little arms over the +counterpane. On its face the flickering light of the fire was coming +and going, making lines about the baby eyes and throwing up the baby +features. It is in such lights that we are startled by resemblances in a +child's face. Pete was startled by a resemblance. He had seen it before, +but not as he saw it now. + +A moment afterwards he was reaching across the cradle again, his arms +spread over it, and his face close down at the child's face, scanning +every line of it as one scans a map. “'Deed, but she is, though,” he +murmured. “She's like him enough, anyway.” + +An awful idea had taken possession of his mind. He rose stiffly to his +feet, and the shawl flapped back. The room seemed to be darkening round +him. He broke the coal, though it was burning brightly, stepped to the +other side of the cradle, and looked at the child again. It was the same +from there. The resemblance was ghostly. + +He felt something growing hard inside of him, and he returned to +his work in the parlour. But the chisel slipped, the mallet fell too +heavily, and he stopped. His mind fluctuated among distant things. He +could not help thinking of Port Mooar, of the Carasdhoo men, of the day +when he and Philip were brought home in the early, morning. + +Putting his tools down, he returned to the room. He was holding his +breath and walking softly, as if in the presence of an invisible thing. +The room was perfectly quiet--he could hear the breath in his nostrils. +In a state of stupor he stood for some time with bis back to the fire +and watched his shadow on the opposite wall and on the ceiling. The +cradle was at his feet. He could not keep his eyes off it. From time to +time he looked down across one of his shoulders. + +With head thrown back and lips apart, the child was breathing calmly and +sleeping the innocent sleep. This angel innocence reproached him. + +“My heart must be going bad,” he muttered. “Your bad thoughts are +blackening the dead. For shame, Pete Quilliam, for shame!” + +He was feeling like a man who is in a storm of thunder and lightning at +night. Familiar things about him looked strange and awful. + +Stooping to the cradle again, he turned back the shawl on to the +cradle-head as a girl turns back the shade of her sun-bonnet Then the +firelight was full on the child's face, and it moved in its sleep. It +moved yet more under his steadfast gaze, and cried a little, as if the +terrible thought that was in his mind had penetrated to its own. + +He was stooping so when the door was opened and Cæsar entered violently, +making asthmatic noises in his throat. Pete looked up at him with a +stupefied air. “Peter,” he said, “will you sell that mortgage?” + +Pete answered with a growl. + +“Will you transfer it to me?” said Cæsar. + +“The time's not come,” said Pete. + +“What time?” + +“The time foretold by the prophet, when the lion can lie down with the +lamb.” + +Pete laughed bitterly. Cæsar was quivering, his mouth was twitching, and +his eyes were wild. “Will you come over to the 'Mitre,' then?” + +“What for to the 'Mitre'?” + +“Ross Christian is there.” + +Pete made an impatient gesture. “That stormy petrel again! He's always +about when there's bad weather going.” + +“Will you come and hear what the man's saying?” + +“What's he saying?” + +“Will you hear for yourself?” + +Pete looked hard at Cæsar, looked again, then caught up his cap and went +out at the door. + + + + +VI. + +With two of his cronies the man had spent the day in a room overlooking +the harbour, drinking hard and playing billiards. Early in the afternoon +a messenger had come from Ballawhaine, saying, “Your father is ill--come +home immediately.” “By-and-bye,” he had said, and gone on with the game. + +Later in the afternoon the messenger had come again, saying, “Your +father has had a stroke of paralysis, and he is calling for you.” “Let +me finish the break first,” he had replied. + +In the evening the messenger had come a third time, saying, “Your father +is unconscious.” “Where's the hurry, then?” he had answered, and he sang +a stave of the “Miller's Daughter”-- + + “They married me against my will, + When I was daughter at the mill.” + +Finally, Cæsar, who had been remonstrating with the Ballawhaine at the +moment of his attack, came to remonstrate with Ross, and to pay off a +score of his own as well. + +“Honour thy father and thy mother, that thy days----” cried Cæsar, with +uplifted arm and the high pitch of the preacher. “But your days will not +be long, anyway, and, if you are the death of that foolish ould man, it +won't be the first death you're answerable for.” + +“So you believe it, too?” said Ross, cue in hand. “You believe your +daughter is dead, do you, old Jephthah Jeremiah? Would you be surprised +to hear, now----” (the cronies giggled) “that she isn't dead at +all?----Good shotr-cannon off the cushion. Halloa! Jephthah Jeremiah +has seen a ghost seemingly. Saw her myself, man, when I was up in town +a month ago. Want to know where she is? Shall I tell you? Oh, you're +a beauty! You're a pattern! You know how to train up a child in the +way----Pocket off the red----It's you to preach at my father, isn't +it? She's on the streets of London--ah, Jeremiah's gone---- + + 'They married me against my will '-- + +There you are, then--good shot--love--twenty-five and nothing left.” + +Pete pushed through to the billiard-room. Fearing there might be +violence, hoping there would be, yet thinking it scarcely proper to lend +the scene of it the light of his countenance, Cæsar had stayed outside. + +“Halloa! here's Uriah!” cried Ross. “Talk of the devil--just thought +as much. Ever read the story of David and Uriah? Should, though. Do +you good, mister. David was a great man. Aw” (with a mock imitation of +Pete's Manx), “a ter'ble, wonderful, shocking great man. Uriah was his +henchman. Ter'ble clavar, too, but that green for all, the ould cow +might have ate him. And Uriah had a nice lil wife. The nice now, you +wouldn't think. But when Uriah was away David took her, and then--and +then” (dropping the Manx) “it doesn't just run on Bible lines neither, +but David told Uriah that his wife was dead--ha! ha! ha!---- + + 'Who saw her diet + I said the fly, + I saw her----' + +Stop that--let go--help----You'll choke me--help! help!” + +At two strides Pete had come face to face with Ross, put one of his +hands at the man's throat and his leg behind him, doubled him back on +his knee, and was holding him there in a grip like that of a vice. + +“Help!--help!--oo--ugh!” The fellow gasped, and his face grew dark. + +“You're not worth it,” said Pete. “I meant to choke the life out of +your dirty body for lying about the living and blackening the dead, but +you're not worth hanging for. You've got the same blood in you, too, and +I'm ashamed for you. There! get up.” + +With a gesture of indescribable loathing, Pete flung the man to the +ground, and he fell over his cue and broke it. + +The people of the house came thronging into the room, and met Pete going +out of it. His face was hard and ugly. At first sight they mistook him +for Ross, so disfigured was he by bad passions. + +Cæsar was tramping the pavement outside. “Will you let me do it now?” he +said in a hot whisper. + +“Do as you like,” said Pete savagely. + +“The wicked is snared in the work of his own hand. Higgaion. Selah,” + said Cæsar, and they parted by the entrance to the Court-house. + +Pete went home, muttering to himself, “The man was lying--she's dead, +she's dead!” + +At the gate of Elm Cottage the dog came up to him, barking with glee. +Then it darted back to the house door, which stood open. “Some one +has come,” thought Pete. “She's dead. The man lied. She's dead,” he +muttered, and he stumbled down the path. + + + + +VII. + +While the Deemster was stepping up to the dais, and the people in the +court were rising to receive him, a poor bedraggled wayfarer was toiling +through the country towards the town. It was a woman. She must have +walked far, her step was so slow and so heavy. From time to time she +rested, not sitting, but standing by the gates of the fields as she came +to them, and holding by the topmost bar. + +When she emerged from the dark lanes into the lamplit streets her pace +quickened for a moment; then it slackened, and then it quickened again. +She walked close to the houses, as if trying to escape observation. +Where there was a short cut through an ill-lighted thoroughfare, she +took it. Any one following her would have seen that she was familiar +with every corner of the town. + +It would be hard to imagine a woman of more miserable appearance. Not +that her clothes were so mean, though they were poor and worn, but that +an air of humiliation sat upon her, such as a dog has when it is lost +and the children are chasing it. Her dress was that of an old woman--the +long Manx cloak of blue homespun, fastened by a great hook close under +the chin, and having a hood which is drawn over the head. But in spite +of this old-fashioned garment, and the uncertainty of her step, she +gave the impression of a young woman. Where the white frill of the old +countrywoman's cap should have shown itself under the flange of the +hood, there was a veil, which seemed to be suspended from a hat. + +The oddity and incongruity of her attire attracted attention. Women came +out of their houses and crossed to the doors of neighbours to look after +her. Even the boys playing at the corners looked up as she went by. + +She was not greatly observed for all that. An unusual interest agitated +the town. A wave of commotion flowed down the streets. The traffic went +in one direction. That direction was the Court-house. + +The Court-house square was thronged on three of its sides by people who +were gathered both on the pavement and on the green inside the railings. +Its fourth side was the dark lane at the back going by the door to the +prisoners' yard and the Deemster's entrance. The windows were lit up and +partly open. Some of the people had edged to the walls as if to listen, +and a few had clambered to the sills as if to see. Around the wide +doorway there was a close crowd that seemed to cling to it like a burr. + +The woman had reached the first angle of the square when the upper half +of the Court-house door broke into light over the heads of the crowd. A +man had come out. He surged through the crowd and “came down to the gate +with a tail of people trailing after him and asking questions. + +“Wonderful!” he was saying. “The Dempster's spaking. Aw, a Daniel come +to judgment, sir. Pity for Tom, though--the man'll get time. I'm sorry +for an ould friend--but the Lord's will be done! Let not the ties of +affection be a snare to our feet--it'll be five years if it's a day, and +(D.V.) he'll never live to see the end of it.” + +It was Cæsar. He crossed the street to the “Mitre.” The woman trembled +and turned towards the lane at the back. She walked quicker than ever +now. But, stumbling over the irregular cobbles of the paved way, she +stopped suddenly at the sound of a voice. By this time she was at the +door to the prisoners' yard, and it was standing open. The door of the +corridor leading by the Deemster's chamber to the Court-house was also +ajar, as if it had been opened to relieve the heat of the crowded room +within. + +“Be just and fear not,” said the voice. “Remember, whatever unconscious +misrepresentations have been made this day, whatever deliberate +false-swearing (and God and the consciences of the guilty ones know well +there have been both), truth is mighty, and in the end it will prevail.” + +The poor bedraggled wayfarer stood in the darkness and trembled. Her +hands clutched at the breast of the cloak, her head dropped into her +breast, and a half-smothered moan escaped from her. She knew the voice; +it had once been very sweet and dear to her; she had heard it at her ear +in tones of love. It was the voice of the Deemster. He was speaking from +the judge's seat; the people were hanging on his lips. + +And he was standing in the shadow of the dark lane under the prisoners' +wall. + +The woman was Kate. It was true that she had been to London; it was +false that she had lived a life of shame there. In six months she had +descended to the depths of poverty and privations. One day she had +encountered Ross. He was fresh from the Isle of Man, and he told her of +the child's illness. The same night she turned her face towards home. It +was three weeks since she had returned to the island, and she was then +low in health, in heart, and in pocket. The snow was falling. It was a +bitter night. Growing dizzy with the drifting whiteness and numb with +the piercing cold, she had crept up to a lonely house and asked shelter +until the storm should cease. + +The house was the home of three old people, two old brothers and an old +sister, who had always lived together. In this household Kate had spent +three weeks of sickness, and the Manx cloak on her back was a parting +gift which the old woman had hung over her thinly-clad shoulders. + +Back in the roads Kate had time to tell herself how foolish was her +journey. She was like a sailor who has alarming news of home in some +foreign port and hears nothing afterwards until he comes to harbour. À +month had passed. So many things might have happened. The child might be +better; it might be dead and buried. Nevertheless she pushed on. + +When she left London she had been full of bitterness towards Philip. It +was his fault that she had ever been parted from her baby. She would go +back. If she brought shame upon him, let him bear it. On coming near +to home this feeling of vengeance died. Nothing was left but a great +longing to be with her little one and a sense of her own degradation. +Every face she recognised seemed to remind her of the change that had +been wrought in herself since she had looked on it last. She dare not +ask; she dare not speak; she dare not reveal herself. + +While she stood in the shadow of the prisoners' yard listening to +Philip's voice, and held by it as by a spell, there was a low hiss and +then a sort of white silence, as when a rocket breaks in the air. The +Deemster had finished; the people in the court were breathing audibly +and moving in their seats. + +A minute later she was standing by her old home, hers no longer, and +haunted in her mind by many bitter memories. It was dark and cheerless. +A candle had been burning in the parlour, but it was now spluttering in +the fat at the socket. As she looked into the room, it blinked and went +out. + +During the last mile of her journey she had made up her mind what she +would do. She would creep up to the house and listen for the sound of a +child's voice. If she heard it, and the voice was that of a child that +was well, she would be content, she would go away. And if she did not +hear it, if the child was gone, if there was no longer any child there, +if it was in heaven, she would go away just the same--only God knew how, +God knew where. + +The road was quiet. With trembling fingers she raised the latch of the +gate, and stepped two paces into the garden. There was no sound from +within. She took two steps more and listened intently. Nothing was +audible. Her heart fell yet lower. She told herself that when a child +lived in a house the very air breathed of its presence, and its little +voice was everywhere. Then she remembered that it was late, that it was +night, that even if the child were well it would now be bathed and in +bed. “How foolish!” she thought, and she took a few steps more. + +She had meant to reach the hall window and look in, butt before she +could do so, something came scudding along the path in her direction. +It was the dog, and he was barking furiously. All at once he stopped and +began to caper about her. Then he broke into barking again, this time +with a note of recognition and delight, shot into the house and came +back, still barking, and making a circle of joyful salutation in the +darkness round her. + +Quaking with fear of instant discovery, she crept under the old tree and +waited. Nobody came from the house. “There's no one at home,” she told +herself, and at that thought the certainty that the child was gone fell +on her as an oppression of distress. + +Nevertheless she stepped up to the porch and listened again. There was +no sound within except the ticking of the clock. Making a call on her +courage, she pushed the door open with the tips of her fingers. It made +a rustle as the bottom brushed over the rushes. At that she uttered +a faint cry and crept back trembling. But all was silence again in an +instant. The fire gave out a strong red glow which spread over the walls +and the ceiling. Her mind took in the impression that the place was +almost empty, but she had no time for such observations. With slow and +stiff motions she slid into the house. + +Then she heard a sleepy whimper and it thrilled her. In an instant she +had seen the thing she looked for--the cradle, with its hood towards the +door and its foot to the fire. At the next moment she was on her knees +beside it, doubled over it and crying softly to the baby, looking so +different, smelling of milk and of sleep, “My darling! my darling!” + +That was the moment when Pete was coming up the path. The dog was +frisking and barking about him. “She's dead,” he was saying. “The man +lied. She's dead.” With that word on his lips he heaved heavily into +the house. As he did so he became aware that some one was there already. +Before his eye had carried the news to his brain, his ear had told him. +He heard a voice which he knew well, though it seemed to be a memory +of no waking moment, but to come out of the darkness and the hours of +sleep. It was a soft and mellow voice, saying, “My beautiful darling! My +beautiful, rosy darling I My darling! My darling!” + +He saw a woman kneeling by the cradle, with both arms buried in it as +though they encircled the sleeping child. Her hood was thrown back, and +her head was bare. The firelight fell on her face, and he knew it. He +passed his hand across his eyes as if trying to wipe out the apparition, +but it remained. He tried to speak, but his tongue was stiff. He stood +motionless and stared. He could not remove his eyes. + +Kate heard the door thrown open, and she lifted her head in terror. Pete +was before her, with a violent expression on his face. The expression +changed, and he looked at her as if she had been a spirit. Then, in a +voice of awe, he said, “Who art thou?” + +“Don't you know me?” she answered timidly. + +It seemed as if he did not hear. “Then it's true,” he muttered to +himself; “the man did not lie.” + +She felt her knees trembling under her. “I haven't come to stay,” she +faltered. “They told me the child was ill, and I couldn't help coming.” + +Still he did not speak to her. As he looked, his face grew awful. The +dew of fear broke out on her forehead. + +“Don't you know me, Pete?” she said in a helpless way. + +Still he stood looking down at her, fixedly, almost threateningly. + +“I am Katherine,” she said, with a downcast look. + +“Katherine is dead,” he answered vacantly. + +“Oh! oh!” + +“She is in her grave,” he said again. + +“Oh, that she were in her grave indeed!” said Kate, and she covered her +face with her hands. + +“She is dead and buried, and gone from this house for ever,” said Pete. + +He did not intend to cast her off; he was only muttering vague words in +the first spasm of his pain; but she mistook them for commands to her to +go. + +There was a moment's silence, and then she uncovered her face and said, +“I understand--yes, I will go away. I oughtn't to have come back at +all--I know that. But I will go now. I won't trouble you any more. I +will never come again.” + +She kissed the child passionately. It rubbed its little face with the +back of its hand, but it did not awake. She pulled the hood on to her +head, and drew the veil over her face. Then she lifted herself feebly +to her feet, stood a moment looking about her, made a faint pathetic cry +and slid out at the door. + +When she was gone, Pete, without uttering a word or a sound, stumbled +into a chair before the fire, put one hand on the cradle, and fell to +rocking it. After some time he looked over his shoulder, like a man who +was coming out of unconsciousness, and said, “Eh?” + +The soul has room for only one great emotion at once, and he had begun +to say to himself, “She's alive! She's here!” The air of the house +seemed to be soft with her presence. Hush! + +He got on to his feet. “Kate!” he called softly, very softly, as if she +were near and had only just crossed the threshold. + +“Kate!” he called again more loudly. + +Then he went out at the porch and floundered along the path, crying +again and again, in a voice of boundless emotion, “Kate! Kate! Kate!” + +But Kate did not hear him. He was tugging at the gate to open it, when +something seemed to give way inside his head, and a hoarse groan came +from his throat. + +“She's better dead,” he thought, and then reeled back to the house like +a drunken man. + +The fire looked black, as if it had gone out. He sat down in the +darkness, and put his hand into his teeth to keep himself from crying +out. + + + + +VIII.. + +The Deemster in the half-lit Court-house was passing sentence. + +“Prisoner,” he said, “you have been found guilty by a jury of your +countrymen of one of the cruellest of the crimes of imposture. You have +deceived the ignorant, betrayed the unwary, lied to the simple, and +robbed the poor. You have built your life upon a lie, and in your old +age it brings you to confusion. In ruder times than ours your +offence would have worn another complexion; it would have been called +witchcraft, not imposture, and your doom would have been death. The +sentence of the court is that you be committed to the Castle Rushen for +the term of one year.” + +Black Tom, who had stood during the Deemster's sentence with his bald +head bent, wiping his eyes on his sleeve and leaving marks on his face, +recovered his self-conceit as he was being hustled out of court. + +“You're right, Dempster,” he cried. “Witchcraft isn't worth nothing now. +Religion's the only roguery that's going these days. Your friend Cæsar +was wise, sir. Bes' re-spec's to him, Dempster, and may you live up to +your own tex' yourself, too.” + +“If my industry and integrity,” said a solemn voice at the door--“and +what's it saying in Scripture?--'If any provide not for his own house he +is worse than an infidel.' But the Lord is my shield. What for should I +defend myself? I am a worm and no man, saith the Psalms.” + +“The Psalms is about right then, Cæsar,” shouted Black Tom from between +two constables. + +In the commotion that followed on the prisoner's noisy removal, the +Clerk of the Court was heard to speak to the Deemster. There was another +case just come in--attempted suicide--woman tried to fling herself into +the harbour--been prevented--would his Honour take it now, or let it +stand over for the High Bailiff's court. + +“We'll take it now,” said the Deemster. “We may dismiss her in a moment, +poor creature.” + +The woman was brought in. She was less like a human creature than like a +heap of half-drenched clothes. A cloak which looked black with the water +that soaked it at the hood covered her body and head. Her face seemed +to be black also, for a veil which she wore was wet, and clung to her +features like a glove. Some of the people in court recognised her figure +even in the uncertain candlelight. She was the woman who had been seen +to come into the town during the hour of the court's adjournment. + +Half helped, half dragged by constables, she entered the prisoner's +dock. There she clutched the bar before her as if to keep herself from +falling. Her head was bent down between her shrinking shoulders as if +she were going through the agony of shame and degradation. + +“The woman shouldn't have been brought here like this--quick, be quick,” + said the Deemster. + +The evidence was brief. One of the constables being on duty in the +market-place had heard screams from the quay. On reaching the place, +he had found the harbour-master carrying a woman up the quay steps. Mr. +Quarry, coming out of the harbour office, had seen a woman go by like +the wind. A moment afterwards he had heard a cry, and had run to the +second steps. The woman had been caught by a boathook in attempting to +get into the water. She was struggling to drown herself. + +The Deemster watched the prisoner intently. “Is anything known about +her?” he asked. + +The clerk answered that she appeared to be a stranger, but she would +give no information. Then the sergeant of police stepped up to the +dock. In emphatic tones the big little person asked the woman various +questions. What was her name? No answer. Where did she come from? No +answer. What was she doing in Ramsey? Still no answer. + +“Your Honour,” said the sergeant, “doubtless this is one of the human +wrecks that come drifting to our shores in the summer season. The +poorest of them are often unable to get away when the season is over, +and so wander over the island, a pest and a burden to every place they +set foot in.” + +Then, turning back to the figure crouching in the dock, he said, “Woman, +are you a street-walker?” + +The woman gave a piteous cry, let go her hold of the bar, sank back to +the seat behind her, brushed up the wet black veil, and covered her face +with her hands. + +“Sit down this instant, Mr. Gawne,” said the Deemster hotly, and there +was a murmur of approval from behind. “We must not keep this woman a +moment longer.” + +He rose, leaned across to the rail in front, clasped his hands before +him, looked down at the woman in the dock, and said in a low tone, +that would have been barely loud enough to reach her ears but for the +silence, as of a tomb, in the court, “My poor woman, is there anybody +who can answer for you?” + +The prisoner stooped her head lower and began to cry. + +“When a woman is so unhappy as to try to take her life, it sometimes +occurs, only too sadly, that another is partly to blame for the +condition that tempts her to the crime.” + +The Deemster's voice was as soft as a caress. + +“If there is such a one in this case, we ought to learn it. He ought to +stand by your side. It is only right; it is only just. Is there anybody +here who knows you?” + +The prisoner was now crying piteously. + +“Ah! we mean no harm to any one. It is in the nature of woman, however +low she may sink, however deep her misfortunes, to shield her dearest +enemy. That is the brave impulse of the weakest among women, and all +good men respect it. But the law has its duty, and in this instance it +is one of mercy.” + +The woman moaned audibly. + +“Don't be afraid, my poor girl. Nobody shall harm you here. Take courage +and look around. Is there anybody in court who can speak for you--who +can tell us how you came to the place where you are now standing?” + +The woman let fall her hands, raised her head, and looked up at the +Deemster, face to face and eye to eye. + +“Yes,” she said, “there is _one_.” + +The Deemster's countenance became pale, his eyes glistened, his look +wandered, his lips trembled--he was biting them, they were bleeding. + +“Remove her in custody,” he muttered; “let her be well cared for.” + +There was a tumult in a moment. Everybody had recognised the prisoner as +she was being taken out, though shame and privation had so altered her. +“Peter Quilliam's wife!”--“Cæsar Cregeen's daughter--where's the man +himself?”--“Then it's truth they're telling--it's not dead she is at +all, but worse.”--“Lor-a-massy!”--“What a trouble for the Dempster!” + +When Kate was gone, the court ought to have adjourned instantly, yet the +Deemster remained in his seat. There was a mist before his eyes which +dazzled him. He had a look at once wild and timid. His limbs pained +although they were swelling to enormous size. He felt as if a heavy, +invisible hand had been laid on the top of his head. + +The clerk caught his eye, and then he rose with an apologetic air, took +hold of the rail, and made an effort to cross the dais. At the next +moment his servant, Jem-y-Lord, had leapt up to his side, but he made an +impatient gesture as if declining help. + +There are three steps going down to the floor of the court, and a +handrail on one side of them. Coming to these steps, he stumbled, +muttered some confused words, and fell forward on to his face. The +people were on their feet by this time, and there was a rush to the +place. + +“Stand back! He has only fainted,” cried Jem-y-Lord. + +“Worse than that,” said the sergeant. “Get him to bed, and send for Dr. +Mylechreest instantly.” + +“Where can we take him?” said somebody. + +“They keep a room for him at Elm Cottage,” said somebody else. + +“No, not there,” said Jem-y-Lord. + +“It's nearest, and there's no time to lose,” said the sergeant. + +Then they lifted Philip, and carried him as he lay, in his wig and gown +as Deemster, to the house of Pete. + + + + +IX. + +There is a kind of mental shock which, like an earthquake under a +prison, bursts open every cell and lets the inmates escape. After a +time, Pete remembered that he was sitting in the dark, and he got up to +light a candle. Looking for candlestick and matches, he went from table +to dresser, from dresser to table, and from table back to dresser, doing +the same thing over and over again, and not perceiving that he was going +round and round. When at length the candle was lighted, he took it in +his hand and went into the parlour like a sleepwalker. He set it on the +mantelpiece, and sat down on the stool. In his blurred vision confused +forms floated about him. “Ah! my tools,” he thought, and picked up the +mallet and two of the chisels. He was sitting with these in his hands +when his eyes fell on the other candlestick, the one in which the candle +had gone out “I meant to light a candle,” he thought, and he got up and +took the empty candlestick into the hall. When he came back with another +lighted candle, he perceived that there were two. “I'm going stupid,” + he thought, and he blew out the first one. A moment afterwards he forgot +that he had done so, and seeing the second still burning, he blew that +out also. + +So dull were his senses that he did not realise that anything was amiss. +His eyes were seeing objects everywhere about--they were growing to +awful size and threatening him. His ears were hearing noises--they were +making a fearful tumult inside his head. + +The room was not entirely dark. A shaft of bleared moonlight came and +went at intervals. The moon was scudding through an angry sky, sometimes +appearing, sometimes disappearing. Pete returned to the stool, and then +he was in the light, but the nameless stone, leaning against the wall, +was in the shade. He took up the mallet and chisels again, intending to +work. “Hush!” he said as he began. The clamour in his brain was so loud +that he thought some one was making a noise in the house. This task was +sacred. He always worked at it in silence. + +_Pat-put! pat-put!_ How long he worked he never knew. There are moments +which are not to be measured as time. In the uncertain handling of the +chisel and the irregular beat of the mallet something gave way. There +was a harsh sound like a groan. A crack like a flash of forked lightning +had shot across the face of the stone. He had split it in half. Its +great pieces fell to the floor on either side of him. Then he remembered +that the stone had been useless. “It doesn't matter now,” he thought. +Nothing mattered. + +With the mallet hanging from his hand he continued to sit in the +drifting moonlight, feeling as if everything in the world had been +shivered to atoms. His two idols had been scattered at one blow--his +wife and his friend. The golden threads that had bound him to life were +broken. When poverty had come, he had met it without repining; when +death had seemed to come, he had borne up against it bravely. But +wifeless, friendless, deceived where he had loved, betrayed where he had +worshipped, he was bankrupt, he was broken, and a boundless despair took +hold of him. + +When hope is entirely gone, anguish will sometimes turn a man into a +monster. There was a fretful cry from the cradle, and, still in the +stupor of his despair, he went out to rock it. The fire, which had only +slid and smouldered, was now struggling into flame, and the child looked +up at him with Philip's eyes. A knife seemed to enter his heart at +that moment. He was more desolate than he had thought. “Hush, my child, +hush!” he said, without thinking. _His_ child? He had none. That solace +was gone. + +Anger came to save his reason. Not to have felt anger, he must have been +less than a man or more. He remembered what the child had been to him. +He remembered what it was when it came, and again when he thought its +mother was dead; he remembered what it was when death frowned on it, and +what it had been since death passed it by. Flesh of his flesh, blood +of his blood, bone of his bone, heart of his heart. Not his merely, but +himself. + +A lie, a mockery, a delusion, a deception! _She_ has practised it. Oh, +she had hidden her secret. She had thought it was safe. But the child +itself had betrayed it. The secret had spoken from the child's own face. + +“Yet I've seen her kneel by the cot and pray, 'God bless my baby, and +its father and its mother'-----” + +Why had he not killed her? A wild vision rose before him of killing +Kate, and then going to the Deemster and saying, “Take me; I have +murdered her because you have dishonoured her. Condemn me to death; yet +remember God lives, and He will condemn you to damnation.” + +But the pity of it--the pity of it! By a quick revolt of tenderness +he recalled Kate as he had just seen her, crouching at the back of the +cradle, like a hunted hare with uplifted paws uttering its last pitiful +cry. He remembered her altered face, so pale even in the firelight, so +thin, so worn, and his anger began to smoke against Philip. The flower +that he would have been proud to wear on his breast Philip had buried in +the dark. Curse him! Curse him! + +She had given up all for that man--husband, child, father, mother, her +friends, her good name, the very light of heaven. How she must have +loved him! Yet he had been ashamed of her, had hidden her away, had been +in fear lest the very air should whisper of her whereabouts. Curse him! +Curse him! Curse him! + +In the heat of his great anger Pete thought of himself also. Jealousy +was far beneath him, but, like all great souls, this simple man had +known something of the grandeur of friendship. Two streams running into +them and taking heaven into their bosom. But Philip had kept him apart, +had banked him off, and yet drained him to the dregs. He had uncovered +his nakedness--the nakedness of his soul itself. + +Bit by bit Pete pieced together the history of the past months. He +remembered the night of Kate's disappearance, when he had gone to +Ballure and shouted up at the lighted window, “I've sent her to +England,” thinking to hide her fault. At that moment Philip had known +all--where she was (for it was where he had sent her), why she was gone, +and that she was gone for ever. Curse him! Curse him! + +Pete recalled the letters--the first one that he had put into Philip's +hand, the second that he had read to him, the third that Philip had +written to his dictation. The little forgeries' to keep her poor name +sweet, the little inventions to make his story plausible, the little +lies of love, the little jests of a breaking heart! And then the +messages! The presents to the child! The reference to the Deemster +himself! And the Deemster had sat there and seen through it all as the +sun sees through glass, yet he had given no sign, he had never spoken; +he had held a quivering, naked heart in his hand, while his own lay +within as cold as a stone. Curse him, O God! Curse him! + +Pete remembered the night when Philip came to tell him that Kate was +dead, and how he had comforted himself with the thought that he was not +altogether alone in his great trouble, because his friend was with him. +He remembered the journey to the grave, the grave itself--another's +grave-how he knelt at the foot of it, and prayed aloud in Philip's +hearing, “Forgive me, my poor girl!” + +“How shall I kill him?” thought Pete. Deemster too! First Deemster now, +and held high in honour! Worshipped for his justice! Beloved for his +mercy! O God! O God! + +There are passions so overmastering that they stifle speech, and man +sinks back to the animal. With an inarticulate shout Pete went to the +parlour and caught up the mallet. A frantic thought had flashed on +him of killing Philip as he sat on the bench which he had disgraced, +administering the law which he had outraged. The wild justice of this +idea made the blood to bubble in his ears. He saw himself holding the +Deemster by the throat, and crying aloud to the people, “You think this +man is a just judge--he is a whited sepulchre. You think he is as true +as the sun--he is as false as the sea. He has robbed me of wife and +child; at the very gates of heaven he has lied to me like hell. The hour +of justice has struck, and thus I pay him--and thus--and thus.” + +But the power of words was lost in the drunkenness of his rage. With +a dismal roar he flung the mallet away, and it rolled on the ground in +narrowing circles. “My hands, my hands,” he thought. He would strangle +Philip, and then he would kill everybody in his way, merely for the lust +of killing. Why not? The fatal line was past. Nothing sacred remained. +The world was a howling wilderness of boundless license. With the savage +growl of a caged beast this wild man flung himself on the door, tore it +open, and bounded on to the path. + +Then he stopped suddenly. There was a thunderous noise outside, such +as the waves make in a cave. A company of people were coming in at the +gate. Some were walking with the heavy step of men who carry a corpse. +Others were bearing lanterns, and a few held high over their heads the +torches which fishermen use when they are hauling the white nets at +night. + +“Who's there?” cried Pete, in a voice that was like a howl. + +“Your friend,” said somebody. + +“_My_ friend? I have no friend,” cried Pete, in a broken roar. + +“'Deed he's gone, seemingly,” said a voice out of the dark. + +Pete did not hear. Seeing the crowd and the lights, but only as darkness +veined with fire, he thought Philip was coming again, as he had so often +seen him come in his glory, in his greatness, in his triumph. + +“Where is he?” he roared. “He's here,” they answered. + +And then Philip was brought up the path in the arms of four bearers, his +head hanging aside and shaking at every step, his face white as the wig +above it, and his gown trailing along the earth. + +There was a sudden calm, and Pete dropped back in awe and horror. A bolt +out of heaven seemed to have fallen at his feet, and he trembled as if +lightning had blinded him. + +Dead! + +His anger had ebbed, his fury had dashed itself against a rock. His +towering rage had shrunk to nothing in the face of this awful presence. +The Dark Spirit had gone before him and snatched his victim out of +his hands. He had come out to kill this man, and here he met him being +brought home dead. + +Dead? Then his sin was dead also. God forgive him! + +God forgive him, where he was gone! Presumptuous man, stand back. + +Oh, mighty and merciful Death! Death the liberator, the deliverer, the +pardoner, the peace-maker! Even the shadow of thy face can quench the +fires of revenge; even the gathering of thy wings can deaden the clamour +of madness, and turn hatred into love and curses into prayers. + + + + +X. + +In that stripped and naked house there was one room still untouched. It +was the room that had been kept for the Deemster. Philip lay on the bed, +motionless and apparently lifeless. Jem-y-Lord stood beating his hands +at the foot. Pete sat on a low stool at the side with his face doubled +on to his knees. Nancy, now back from Sulby, was blowing into the bars +of the grate to kindle a fire. A little group of men stood huddled like +sheep near the door. + +Some one said the Deemster's heart was beating. They brought from +another room a little ivory hand-glass and held it over the mouth. When +they raised it the face of the mirror was faintly blurred. + +That little cloud on the glass seemed more bright than the shining tread +of an angel on the sea. Jem-y-Lord took a sponge and began to moisten +the cold forehead. One by one the people behind produced their old +wife's wisdom. Somebody remembered that his grandmother always put salts +to the nostrils of a person seemingly dead; somebody else remembered +that when, on the very day of old Iron Christian's death, his father had +been thrown by a colt and lay twelve hours unconscious, the farrier had +bled him and he had opened his eyes instantly. + +The doctor had been half an hour gone to Ballaugh, and a man had been +put on a horse and sent after him. But it was a twelve-miles' journey; +the night was dark; it would be a good hour before he could be back. + +They touched Pete on the shoulder and suggested something. + +“Eh?” he answered vacantly. + +“Dazed,” they told themselves. The poor man could not give a wise-like +answer. He had had a shock, and there was worse before him. They talked +in low voices of Kate and of Ross Christian; they were sorry for Pete; +they were still more sorry for the Deemster. + +The Deemster's wig had been taken off and tossed on to the +dressing-table. It lay mouth upwards like any old woman's night-cap. +His hair had dragged after it on the pillow. The black gown had not been +removed, but it was torn open at the neck so that the throat might be +free. One of Philip's arms had dropped over the side of the bed, and the +long, thin hand was cold and green and ethereal as marble. + +Pete was crouching on his low stool beside this hand. He needed no +softening to touch it now. The chill fingers were in his palm, and his +hot tears were falling on them. Remembering the crime that he had so +nearly committed, he was holding himself in horror. His friend! His +life-long friend! His only friend! The Deemster no longer, but only the +man. Not the man either, but the child. The cruel years had rolled back +with all their burden of trouble. Forgotten days were come again--days +long buried under the _débris_ of memory. They were boys together again. +A little, sunny fellow in velvet, and a bigger lad in a stocking-cap; +the little one talking, always talking; the big one listening, always +listening; the little one proposing, the big one agreeing; the little +one leading, the big one following; the little one looking up and yet +a little down, the big one looking down and yet a little up. Oh, the +happy, happy times, before anger and jealousy and rage and the mad +impulse of murder had darkened their sun shine! + +The memories that brought the tenderest throb to Pete as he sat there +fingering the lifeless hand were of the great deeds that he had done for +Philip--how he had fought for him, and been licked for him, and taken +bloody noses for him, and got thrashed for it by Black Tom. But +there were others only less tender. Philip was leaving home for King +William's, and Pete was cudgelling his dull head what to give him for a +parting gift. Decision was the more difficult because he had nothing +to give. At length he had hit on making a whistle--the only thing his +clumsy fingers had ever been deft at. With his clasp-knife he had cut +a wondrous big one from the bough of a willow; he had pared it; he had +turned it; it blew a blast like a fog-horn. The morning was frosty, and +his feet were bare, but he didn't mind the cold; he didn't feel it--no, +not a ha'p'orth. He was behind the hedge by the gate at Ballure, waiting +for the coach that was to take up Philip, and passing the time by +polishing the whistle on the leg of his shining breeches, and testing +its tone with just one more blow. Then up came Crow, and out came Philip +in his new peaked cap and leggings. Whoop! Gee-up! Away! Off they went +without ever seeing him, without once looking back, and he was left in +the prickly hedge with his blue feet on the frost, a look of dejection +about his mouth, and the top of the foolish whistle peeping out of his +jacket-pocket. + +The thick sob that came of these memories was interrupted by a faint +sound from the bed. It was a murmur of delirium, as soft as the hum of +bees, yet Pete heard it. + +“Cover me up, Pete, cover me up!” said Philip, dreaming aloud. + +Philip was a living man! Thank God! Thank God! + +A whisper goes farther than a shout. The people behind whispered the +news to the passage, the passage to the stairs, the stairs to the hall, +and the hall to the garden, where a crowd had gathered in the darkness +to look up at the house over which the angel of death was hovering. + +In a moment the room was croaking like a frog-pond. “Praise the Lord!” + cried one. “His mercy endureth for ever,” cried another. “What's he +saying?” said a third. “Rambling in his head, poor thing,” said a +fourth. + +Pete turned them out--all except Jem-y-Lord, who was still moistening +the Deemster's face and opening his hands, which were now twitching and +tightening. + +“Out of this! Out you go!” cried Pete hoarsely. + +“No use taking the anger with him--the man's tried,” they muttered, and +away they went. + +Jemmy was loth to see them go. He was afraid to be left alone with +Pete--afraid that the Deemster should be at the mercy of this wild +creature with the flaming eyes. + +And now that Philip was a living man Pete began to feel afraid of +himself. At sight of life in Philip's face, his gnawing misery returned. +He thought his hatred had been overcome, but he was wrestling in the +throes of forgiveness again. Here was the man who had robbed him of wife +and child and home! In another moment he might have held him in the grip +of his just wrath. + +It is an inscrutable and awful fact, that just at that moment when a +man's good angel has conquered, but is spent, his evil angel is sure to +get the advantage of chance. Philip's delirium set in strong, and the +brute beast in Pete, going through its final struggle, stood over the +bed and watched him. In his violence Philip tore at his breast, and +dragged something from beneath his shirt. A moment later it fell from +his graspless fingers to the floor. It was a lock of dark hair. Pete +knew whose hair it was, and he put his foot on it, and that instant the +mad impulse came again to take Philip by the throat and choke him. Again +and again it came. He had to tread it down even amid his sobs and his +tears. + +But love cannot be killed in an instant. It does not drop down dead. +There was a sort of tenderness in the thought that this was the man for +whom Kate had given up all the world. Pete began to feel gently towards +Philip because Kate loved him; he began to see something of Kate in +Philip's face. This strange softening increased as he caught the words +of Philip's delirium. He thought he ought to leave the room, but he +could not tear himself away. Crouching down on the stool, he clasped +his hands behind his head, and tightened his arms over his ears. It was +useless. He could not help but listen. Only disjointed sentences, odd +pages torn from the book of life, some of them blurred with tears; but +they were like a cool hand on a fevered brow to him that heard him. + +“I was a child, Philip----didn't know what love was then----coming home +by Ramsey steamer----tell the simple truth, Philip----say we tried to be +faithful and loyal and could not, because we loved each other, and +there was no help for----tell Kirry----yes, Auntie, I have read father's +letters----that picture is cracked----” + +This in the voice of one who speaks in his sleep, and then in a hushed, +hot whisper, “Haven't I a right to you?----yes, I have a right----take +your topcoat, then, the storm is coming----I'll never let you +go----don't you remember?----can you ever forget----my husband!----my +husband!” + +Pete lifted his head as he listened. He had been thinking that Philip +had robbed him of Kate. Was it he who had robbed Kate of Philip? + +“I can't live any longer in this house, Philip----the walls are crushing +me; the ceiling is falling on me; the air is stifling me----three +o'clock, Pete----yes, three to-morrow, in the Council Chamber at +Douglas----I'm not a bad woman, Philip Christian----there is something +you have never guessed and I have never told you----is it the child, +Kate?----did you say the child?----you are sure----you are not deceiving +yourself?” + +All this in a tone of deep entreaty, and then, with quick-coming breath, +“Jemmy, get the carriage at Shimmin's and drive it yourself----if there +is any attempt at Ramsey to take the horse out----drive to the lane +between the chapel and the cottage----the moment the lady joins +you----you are right, Kate----you cannot live here any longer----this +life of deception must end----that's the churring of the night-jar going +up to Ballure Glen.” + +Jem-y-Lord, who was beating out the pillow, dropped it, in his fumbling, +half over the Deemster's face, and looked at Pete in terror. Would this +cruel delirium never break? Where was the doctor? Would he not come at +all? + +Pete had risen to his feet, and was gazing down with a look of stupor. +He had been thinking that Philip had robbed him of the child. Was it he +who had robbed Philip? + +“Yes, Pete is telling the same story. He is writing letters to +himself----such simple things!----poor old Pete----he means no +harm----he never dreams that every word is burning----Jemmy, leave out +more brandy to-night, the decanter is empty----” + +Pete leaned over the pillow. All at once he started back. Philip's eyes +were open and shining up at him. It was hard to believe that Philip was +not speaking to him eye to eye. But there was a veil between them, the +veil of the hand of God. + +“I know, Philip, _I_ know,” said the unconscious man in a quick whisper; +he was breathing fast and loud. “Tell him I'm dead----yes, yes, that's +it, that's it----cruel?----no, but kind----'Poor girl,' he'll say, 'I +loved her once, but she's gone'----I'll do it, I'll do it.” Then, in +tones of fear, “It's madness----to paint faces on the darkness, to hear +voices in the air is madness.” And then, solemnly, with a chill, thick +utterance, “There----there----that one by the wall----” + +Big drops of sweat broke out on Pete's forehead. Had he been thinking +that Philip had tortured him? It was he who had been torturing Philip. +The letters, the messages, the presents, these had been the whips and +scorpions in his hand. Every innocent word, every look, every sign, had +been as thongs in the instrument of torture. Pete began to feel a great +pity for Philip. “He had suffered plenty,” thought Pete. “He has carried +this cross about far enough.” + +“Good-night, boatman!----I went too far----yes, I am back again, thank +God----” + +These words brightly, cheerily, hopefully; then, in the deepest tones, +“Good-bye, Philip----it's all my fault----I've broken the heart of one +man, and I'm destroying the soul of another----I'm leaving this lock +of hair--it is all I have to leave----good-bye!----I ought to have gone +long ago----you will not hate me now----” + +The last words frayed off, broke in the throat, and stopped. Then +quickly, with panting breath, came, “Kate! Kate! Kate!” again and again +repeated, beginning in a loud beseeching cry and dying down to a long +wail, as if shouted over a gloomy waste wherein the voice was lost. + +Jem-y-Lord had been beating round towards the door, wringing his white +hands like a woman, and praying to God that the Deemster might never +come out of his unconsciousness. “He has told him everything,” thought +Jem. “The man will take his life.” + +“I came between them,” thought Pete. “She was not for me. She was not +mine. She was Philip's. It was God's doings.” + +The bitterness of Pete's heart had passed away. “But I wish----what's +the good of wishing, though? God help us all,” he muttered, in a +breaking voice, and then he crouched down on the stool as before and +covered his face with his hands.. + +Philip had lifted his head and risen on one elbow. He was looking out +on the empty air with his glassy eyes, as if a picture stood up before +them. + +“Yes, no, yes----don't tell me----that Kate?----it's a mistake----that's +not Kate----that white face!----those hollow eyes!----that miserable +woman!----besides, Kate is dead----she must be dead----what's to do +with the lamps?----they are going out----in the dock, too, and before +me----she there and I here!----she the prisoner, I the judge!” + +All this with violent emotion, and with one arm outstretched over Pete's +crouching head. + +“If I could hear her voice, though----perhaps her voice now----I'm going +to fall----it's Kate, it's Kate! Oh! oh!” + +Philip had paused for several seconds, as if trying to listen, and then, +with a loud cry of agony, he had closed his eyes and rolled back on to +the pillow. + +“God has meant me to hear all this,” thought Pete. God had intended that +for this, the peace of his soul, he should follow the phases of this +drama of a naked heart. He was sobbing, but his sobs were like growls. + +“What's he doing now?” thought Jem-y-Lord, craning his neck at the door. +“Shall I call for somebody?” + +Pete had picked up from the floor the lock of hair that had been lying +under his foot, and he was putting it back into Philip's breast. + +“Nothing but me between them,” he thought, “nothing but me.” + +“Sit down, sir,” cried the unconscious man. It was only the last +outbreak of Philip's delirium, but Pete trembled and shrank back. + +Then Philip groaned and his blue lips quivered. He opened his eyes. They +wandered about the room for a moment, and afterwards fixed themselves on +Pete in a long and haggard gaze. Pete's own eyes were too full of tears +to be full of sight, but he could see that the change had come. He +panted with expectation, and looked down at Philip with doglike delight. + +There was a moment's silence, and then, in a voice as faint as a breath, +Philip murmured. “What's----where's----is it Pete?” + +At that Pete uttered a shout of joy. “He's himself! He's himself! Thank +God!” + +“Eh?” said Philip helplessly. + +“Don't you be bothering yourself now,” cried Pete. “Lie quiet, boy; +you're in your own room, and as nice as nice.” + +“But,” said Philip, “will you not kindly----” + +“Not another word, Phil. It's nothing. You're all serene, and about as +right as ninepence.” + +“Your Honour has been delirious,” said Jem-y-Lord. + +“Chut!” said Pete behind his hand, and then, with another joyful shout, +“Is it a beefsteak you'll be having, Phil, or a dish of tay and a +herring?” + +Philip looked perplexed. “But could you not help me----” he faltered. + +“You fainted in the Court-house, sir,” said Jem-y-Lord. + +“Ah!” It had all come back. + +“Hould your whisht, you gawbie,” whispered Pete, and he made a furtive +kick at Jemmy's shins. + +Pete was laughing and crying in one breath. In the joyful reflux from +evil passions the great fellow was like a boy. He poked the fire into a +blaze, snuffed the candle with his fingers, sang out “My gough!” when he +burnt them, and then hopped about the floor and cut as many capers as a +swallow after a shower of rain. + +Philip looked at him and relapsed into silence. It seemed as if he had +been on a journey and something had happened in his absence. The secret +which he had struggled so long to confess had somehow been revealed. + +Jem-y-Lord was beating out his pillows. “Does he know?” said Philip.-- +“Yes,” whispered Jemmy. + +“Everything!” + +“Everything. You have been delirious.” + +“Delirious!” said Philip, with alarm. + +Then he struggled to rise. “Help me up. Let me go away. Why did you +bring me here?” + +“I couldn't help it, sir. I tried to prevent----” + +“I cannot face him,” said Philip. “I am afraid. Help me, help me.” + +“You are too weak, sir. Lie still. No one shall harm you. The doctor is +coming.” + +Philip sank back with a look of fear. “Water,” he cried feebly. + +“Here it is,” said Jem-y-Lord, lifting from the dressing-table the jug +out of which he had moistened the sponge. + +“Tut!” cried Pete, and he tipped the jug so that half the water spilled. +“Brandy for a man when he's in bed, you goosey gander. Hould, hard, boy; +I've a taste of the rael stuff in the cupboard. Half a minute, mate. +A drop will be doing no harm at all,” and away he went down the stairs +like a flood, almost sweeping over Nancy, who had come creeping up in +her stockings at the sound of voices. + +The child had awakened in its cradle, and, with one dumpy leg over its +little quilt, it was holding quiet converse with its toes. + +“Hollo, young cockalorum, is it there you are!” shouted Pete. + +At the next moment, with a noggin bottle of brandy in his fist, he was +leaping upstairs, three steps at a time. + +Meanwhile Jem-y-Lord had edged up to the Deemster and whispered, with +looks of fear and mystery, “Don't take it, sir.” + +“What?” said Philip vacantly.--“The brandy,” said Jem. + +“Eh?” + +“It will be----” began Jem, but Pete's step was thundering up the +stairs, and with a big opening of the mouth, rather than an audible +utterance of the tongue, he added, “poisoned.” + +Philip could not comprehend, and Pete came shouting-- + +“Where's your water, now, ould Snuff-the-Wind?” + +While Pete was pouring the brandy into a glass and adding the water, +Jemmy caught up a scrap of newspaper that was lying about, rummaged +for a pencil, wrote some words on the margin, tore the piece off, and +smuggled it into the Deemster's hand. + +“Afraid of Pete!” thought Philip. “It is monstrous! monstrous!” + +At that moment there was the sound of a horse's hoofs on the road. + +“The doctor,” cried Jem-y-Lord. “The doctor at last. Wait, sir, wait,” + and he ran downstairs. + +“Here you are,” cried Pete, coming to the bedside, glass in hand. “Drink +it up, boy. It'll stiffen you. My faith, but it's a oner. Aw, God is +good, though. He's all that. He's good tremenjous.” + +Pete was laughing; he was crying; he was tasting a new sweetness--the +sweetness of being a good man again. + +Philip was holding Jem-y-Lord's paper before his eyes, and trying to +read it. + +“What's this that Jemmy has given me?” he said. “Read it, Pete. My eyes +are dazed.” + +Pete took the paper in his left hand, still holding the glass in his +right. To get the light on to the writing he went down on his knees by +the bed-head and leaned over towards the fire. Then, like a school-boy +repeating his task, he read in a singsong voice the words that +Jem-y-Lord had written:--“Don't drink the brandy. Pete is trying to kill +you.” + +Pete made a grating laugh. “That's a pretty thing now,” he began, but +he could not finish. His laughter ceased, his eyes opened wide, his +tongue seemed to hang out of his mouth, and he turned his head and +looked back with an agony of doubt into Philip's face. + +Philip struggled up. “Give me the brandy, Pete.” He took the glass out +of Pete's hand, and without a second thought, with only a smile of faith +and confidence, he raised it to his lips and drank. When the doctor +entered the room a moment afterwards, Pete was sobbing into the +bed-clothes, and Philip's hand was resting on his head. + + + + +XI. + +Early the next morning Pete visited Kate in prison. He had something +to say to her, something to ask; but he intended to keep back his own +feelings, to bear himself bravely, to sustain the poor girl's courage. +The light was cold and ashen within the prison walls, and as he followed +the sergeant into the cell, he could not help but think of Kate as he +had first known her, so bright, so merry, so full of life and gaiety. +He found her now doubled up on a settle by a newly-kindled fire in the +sergeant's own apartment. She lifted her head, with a terrified look, +as he entered, and she saw his hollow cheeks and deep eyes and ragged +beard. + +“I'm not coming to trouble you,” he said. “I've forgiven _him_, and I'm +forgiving you, too.” + +“You are very good,” she answered nervously. + +“Good?” He gave a crack of bitter laughter. “I meant to kill him--that's +how good I am. And it's the same as if all the devils out of hell had +been at me the night through to do it still. Maybe I hadn't much +to forgive. I'm like a bat in the light--I'm not knowing where I am +ezactly. Daresay the people will laugh at me when they're getting to +know. Wouldn't trust, but they'll think me a poor-spirited cur, anyway. +Let them--there's never much pity for the dog that's licked.” + +His voice shook, although so hard and so husky. “That's not what I came +to say, though. You'll be laving this place soon, and I'm wanting to +ask--I'm wanting to know----” + +She had covered her face, and now she said through her hands, “Do as you +like with me, Pete. You are my husband, and I must obey.” + +He looked down at her for a moment. “But you cannot love me?” + +“I have deceived you, and whatever you tell me to do I will do it.” + +“But you cannot love me?” + +“I'll be a good wife for the future* Pete--I will, indeed, indeed I +will.” + +“But you cannot love me?” + +She began to cry. “That's enough,” he said. “I'll not force you.” + +“You are very good,” she said again. + +He laughed more bitterly than before. “Dou yo think I'm wanting your +body while another man has your heart? That's a game I've played about +long enough, I'm thinking. Good? Not me, missis.” + +His eyes, which had been fixed on the fire, wandered to his wife, and +then his lips quivered and his manner changed. + +“I'm hard--I'll cut it short. Fact is, I've detarmined to do something, +but I've a question to ask first. You've suffered since you left me, +Kate. He has dragged you down a dale--but tell me, do you love him +still?” + +She shuddered and crept closer to the wall. + +“Don't be freckened. It's a woman's way to love the man that's done +wrong by her. Being good to her is nothing--sarvice is nothing--kindness +is nothing. Maybe there's some ones that cry shame on her for that--but +not me. Giving herself, body and soul, and thinking nothing what she +gets for it--that's the glory of a woman when she cares for anybody. +Spake up, Kate--do you love him in spite of all?” + +The answer came in a whisper that was like a breath--“Yes.” + +“That'll do,” said Pete. + +He pressed his hand against the place of his old wound. “I might have +known you could never care for me--I might have known that,” he said +with difficulty. “But don't think I can't stand my rackups, as the +saying is. I know my course now--I know my job.” + +She was sobbing into her hands, and he was breathing fast and loud. + +“One word more--only one--about the child.” + +“Little Katherine!” + +“Have I a right to her?” + +She gasped audibly, but did not answer, and he tried a second time. + +“Does she belong to me, Kate?” + +Her confusion increased. He tried a third time, speaking more gently +than before. + +“If I should lave the island, Kate, could I--must I--may I take the +child along with me?” + +At that her fear got the better of her shame, and she cried, “Don't take +her away. Oh, don't, don't!” + +“Ah!” + +He pressed his hand hard at his side again. + +“But maybe that's only mother's love, and what mother----” + +He broke off and then began once more, in a voice so low that it was +scarcely to be heard. “Tell me, when the time comes--and it will come, +Kate, have no fear about that----” + +He was breaking down, he was struggling hard. “When the time comes for +himself and you to be together, will you be afraid to have the +little one with you--will it seem wrong, Kate--you two and little +Katherine--one household--one family--no?--n--o?” + +“No.” + +“That's enough.” + +The words seemed to come out of the depths of his throat. “I've nothing +more to think about. _He_ must think of all the rest.” + +“And you, Pete?” + +“What matter about me? D'ye think there's anything worse coming? D'ye +think I'm caring what I ate, and what I drink, and what becomes of me?” + +He was laughing again, and her sobs broke out afresh. + +“God is good,” he said more quietly. “He'll take care of the likes of +me.” + +His motionless eyes were on the crackling fire, and he stood in the +light that flashed from it with a face like stone. “I've no child now,” + he muttered, as though speaking to himself. + +She slid to her knees at his feet, took the hand that hung by his side +and began to cover it with kisses. “Forgive me,” she said; “I have been +very weak and very guilty.” + +“What's the use of talking like that?” he answered. “What's past is +past,” and he drew his hand away. “No child now, no child now,” he +muttered again, as though his dispair cried out to God. + +He was feeling like a man wrecked in mid-ocean. A spar came floating +towards him. It was all he could lay hold of from the foundering ship, +in which he had sailed, and sung, and laughed, and slept. He had thought +to save his life by it, but another man was clinging to it, and he had +to drop it and go down. + +She could not look into his face again; she could not touch his hand; +she could not ask for his forgiveness. He stood over her for a moment +without speaking, and then, with his hollow cheeks, and deep eyes, and +ragged heard, he went away in the morning sunlight. + + + + +XII. + +Phillip fell into a deep sleep. When he awoke, he saw, as in a mirror, +a solution to the tumultuous drama of his life. It was a glorious +solution, a liberating and redeeming end, an end bringing freedom from +the bonds which had beset him. What matter if it was hard; if it was +difficult; if it was bitter as Marah and steep as Calvary? He was ready, +he was eager. Oh, blessed sleep! Oh, wise and soothing sleep I It +had rent the dark cloud of his past and given the flash of light that +illumined the path before him. + +He opened his eyes and saw Auntie Nan seated by his side, reading a +volume of sermons. At the change in his breathing the old dove looked +round, dropped the book, and began to flutter about. “Hush, dearest, +hush!” she whispered. + +There was a heavy, monotonous sound, like the beating of a distant drum +or the throb of an engine under the earth. + +“Auntie!”--“Yes, dearest.” + +“What day is it?” + +“Sunday. Oh, you've had a long, long sleep, Philip. You slept all day +yesterday.” + +“Is that the church-bell ringing?” + +“Yes, dear, and a fine morning, too--so soft and springlike. I'll open +the window.” + +“Then my hearing must be injured.” + +“Ah! they muffled the bell--that's it. 'The church is so near,' they +said, 'it might trouble him.'” + +A carriage was coming down the road. It rattled on the paved way; then +the rattling ceased, and there was a dull rumble as of a cart sliding +on to a wooden bridge. “That horse has fallen,” said Philip, trying to +rise. + +“It's only the straw on the street,” said Auntie Nan. “The people +brought it from all parts. 'We must deaden the traffic by the house,' +they said. Oh, you couldn't think how good they've been. Yesterday was +market-day, but there was no business done. Couldn't have been; they +were coming and going the whole day long. 'And how's the Deemster now?' +'And how's he now?' It was fit to make you cry. I believe in my heart, +Philip, nobody in Ramsey went to bed the first night at all. Everybody +waiting and waiting to see if there wasn't something to fetch, and the +kettle kept boiling in every kitchen round about. But hush, dearest, +hush! Not so much talking all at once. Hush, now!” + +“Where is Pete?” asked Philip, his face to the wall. + +“Oiling the hinges of the door, dearest. He was laying carpets on the +stairs all day yesterday. But never the sound of a hammer. The man's +wonderful. He must have hands like iron. His heart's soft enough, +though. But then everybody is so kind--everybody, everybody! The doctor, +and the vicar, and the newspapers--oh, it's beautiful! It's just as Pete +was saying.” + +“What was Pete saying, Auntie?” + +“He was saying the angels must think there's somebody sick in every +house in the island.” + +A sound of singing came through the open window, above the whisper of +young leaves and the twitter of birds. It was the psalm that was being +sung in church-- + + “Blessed is the man that considereth the poor and needy; + The Lord shall deliver him in time of trouble.” + +“Listen, Philip. That must be a special psalm. I'm sure they're singing +it for you. How sweet of them! But we are talking too much, dear. The +doctor will scold. I must leave you now, Philip. Only for a little, +though, while I go back to Bal lure, and I'll send up Cottier.” + +“Yes, send up Cottier,” said Philip. + +“My darling,” said the old soul, looking down as she tied her bonnet +strings. “You'll lie quiet now? You're sure you'll lie quiet? Well, good +bye! good-bye!” + +As Philip lay alone the soar and swell of the psalm filled the room. +Oh, the irony of it all! The frantic, hideous, awful irony! He was +lying there, he, the guilty one, with the whole island watching at his +bedside, pitying him, sorrowing for him, holding its breath until he +should breathe, and she, his partner, his victim, his innocent victim, +was in jail, in disgrace, in a degradation more deep than death. Still +the psalm soared and swelled. He tried to bury his head in the pillows +that he might not hear. + +Jem-y-Lord came in hurriedly and Philip beckoned him close. “Where is +she?” he whispered. + +“They removed her to Castle Rushen late last night, your Honour,” said +Jemmy softly. + +“Write immediately to the Clerk of the Bolls,” said Philip. “Say she +must be lodged on the debtors' side and have patients' diet and every +comfort. My Kate! my Kate!” he kept saying, “it shall not be for long, +not for long, my love, not for long!” + +The convalescence was slow and Philip was impatient. “I feel better +to-day, doctor,” he would say, “don't you think I may get out of bed?” + +“_Traa dy liooar_ (time enough), Deemster,” the doctor would answer. +“Let us see what a few more days will do.” + +“I have a great task before me, doctor,” he would say again. “I must +begin immediately.” + +“You have a life's work before you, Deemster, and you must begin soon, +but not just yet.” + +“I have something particular to do, doctor,” he said at last. “I must +lose no time.” + +“You must lose no time indeed, that's why you must stay where you are a +little longer.” + +One morning his impatience overcame him, and he got out of bed. But, +being on his feet, his head reeled, his limbs trembled, he clutched at +the bed-post, and had to clamber back. “Oh God, bear me witness, this +delay is not my fault,” he murmured. + +Throughout the day he longed for the night, that he might close his eyes +in the darkness and think of Kate. He tried to think of her as she +used to be--bright, happy, winsome, full of joy, of love, of passion, +dangling her feet from the apple-tree, or tripping along the tree-trunk +in the glen, teasing him? tempting him. It was impossible. He could +only think of her in, the gloom of the prison. That filled his mind with +terrors. Sometimes in the dark hours his enfeebled body beset his brain +with fantastic hallucinations. Calling for paper and pens, he would make +show of writing a letter, producing no words or intelligible signs, but +only a mass of scrawls and blotches. This he would fold and refold with +great elaboration, and give to Jem y-Lord with an air of gravity and +mystery, saying in a whisper, “For her!” Thus night brought no solace, +and the dawn found him waiting for the day, that he might open his eyes +in the sunlight and think, “She is better where she is; God will comfort +her.” + +A fortnight went by and he saw nothing of Pete. At length he made a call +on his courage and said, “Auntie, why does Pete never come?” + +“He does, dearest. Only when you're asleep, though. He stands there in +the doorway in his stockings. I nod to him and he comes in and looks +down at you. Then he goes away without a word.” + +“What is he doing now?” + +“Going to Douglas a good deal seemingly. Indeed, they're saying--but +then people are so fond of talking.” + +“What are people saying, Auntie?” + +“It's about a divorce, dearest!” + +Philip groaned and turned away his face. + +He opened his eyes one day from a doze, and saw the plain face of Nancy +Joe, framed in a red print handkerchief. The simple creature was talking +with Auntie Nan, holding council, and making common cause with the +dainty old lady as unmarried women and old maids both of them. + +“'Why don't you keep your word true?' says I. 'Wasn't you saying you'd +take her back,' says I, 'whatever she'd done and whatever she was, so +help you God?' says I. 'Isn't she shamed enough already, poor thing, +without you going shaming her more? Have you no bowels at all? Are you +only another of the gutted herrings on a stick?' says I. 'Why don't you +keep your word true?' 'Because,' says he, 'I want to be even with the +other one,' says he, and then away he went wandering down by the tide.” + +“It's unchristian, Nancy,” said Auntie Nan, “but it's human; for +although he forgives the woman, he can hardly be expected to forgive the +man, and he can't punish one without punishing both.” + +“Much good it'll do to punish either, say I. What for should he put up +his fins now the hook's in his gizzard? But that's the way with the men +still. Talking and talking of love and love; but when trouble is coming, +no better than a churn of sour cream on a thundery day. We're best off +that never had no truck with them--I don't know what you think, Miss +Christian, ma'am. They may talk about having no chances--I don't mind +if they do--do you? I had chance enough once, though--I don't know what +you've had, ma'am. I had one sweetheart, anyway--a sort of a sweetheart, +as you might say; but he was sweeter on the money than on me. Always +asking how much I had got saved in the stocking. And when he heard I had +three new dresses done, 'Nancy,' says he, 'we had better be putting a +sight up on the parzon now, before they're all wore out at you.'” + +The Governor, who was still in London, wrote a letter full of tender +solicitude and graceful compliment. The Clerk of the Rolls had arranged +from the first that two telegrams should be sent to him daily, giving +accounts of Philip's condition. At last the Clerk came in person, +and threw Auntie Nan into tremors of nervousness by his noise and +robustious-ness. He roared as he came along the path, roared himself +through the hall, up the stairs, and into the bedroom, roared again +as he set eyes on Philip, protesting that the sick man was worth five +hundred dead men yet, and vowing with an oath (and a tear trickling down +his nose) that he would like to give “time” to the fools who frightened +good people with bad reports. Then he cleared the room for a private +consultation. “Out you go, Cottier. Look slippy, man!” + +Auntie Nan fled in terror. When she had summoned resolution to invade +afresh the place of the bear that had possession of her lamb, the Clerk +of the Rolls was rising from the foot of the bed and saying-- + +“We'll leave it at that then, Christian. These d------ things _will_ +happen; but don't you bother your head about it. I'll make it all +serene. Besides, it's nothing--nothing in a lifetime. I'll have to send +you the summons, though. You needn't trouble about that; just toss it +into the fire.” + +Philip's head was down, his eyes were on the counterpane, and a faint +tinge of colour overspread his wasted face. + +“Ah! you're back, Miss Christian? I must be going, though. Good-bye, +old fellow! Take care of yourself--good men are scarce. Good-bye, Miss +Christian! Good-bye, all! Good-bye, Phil! God bless you!” + +With that he went roaring down the stairs, but came thunging up again in +a moment, put his head round the doorpost, and said-- + +“Lord bless my soul, if I wasn't forgetting an important bit of +news--very important news, too! It hasn't got into the papers yet, +but I've had the official wrinkle. What d'ye think?--the Governor has +resigned! True as gospel. Sent in his resignation to the Home Office +the night before last. I saw it coming. He hasn't been at home since +Tynwald. Look sharp and get better now. Good-bye!” + +Philip got up for the first time the day following. The weather was soft +and full of whispers of spring; the window was open and Philip sat with +his face in the direction of the sea. Auntie Nan was knitting by his +side and running on with homely gossip. The familiar and genial talk +was floating over the surface of his mind as a sea-bird floats over the +surface of the sea, sometimes reflected in it, sometimes skimming it, +sometimes dipping into it and being lost. + +“Poor Pete! The good woman here thinks he's hard. Perhaps he is; but I'm +sure he is much to be pitied. Ross has behaved badly and deserves all +that can come to him. 'He's the same to me as you are, dear--in blood, +I mean--but somehow I can't be sorry.... Ah! you're too tender-hearted, +Philip, indeed you are. You'd find excuses for anybody. The doctor says +overwork, dearest; but _I_ say the shock of seeing that poor creature in +that awful position. And what a shock you gave me, too! To tell you the +truth, Philip, I thought it was a fate. Never heard of it? No? Never +heard that grandfather fainted on the bench? He did, though, and he +didn't recover either. How well I remember it! Word broke over the town +like a clap of thunder, 'The Deemster has fallen in the Court-house.' +Father heard it up at Ballure and ran down bareheaded. Grandfather's +carriage was at the Courthouse door, and they brought him up to +Ballawhaine. I remember I was coming downstairs when I saw the carriage +draw up at the gate. The next minute your father, with his wild eyes and +his bare head, was lifting something out of the inside. Poor Tom! He had +never set foot in the house since grandfather had driven him out of it. +And little did grandfather think in whose arms he was to travel the last +stage of his life's journey.” + +Philip had fallen asleep. Jem-y-Lord entered with a letter. It was in a +large envelope and had come by the insular post. + +“Shall I open it?” thought Auntie Nan. She had been opening and replying +to Philip's letters during the time of his illness, but this one bore +an official seal, and so she hesitated. “Shall I?” she thought, with the +knitting needle to her lip. “I will. I may save him some worry.” + +She fixed her glasses and drew out the letter. It was a summons from the +Chancery Division of the High Court of Justice--a petition for divorce. +The petitioner's name was Peter Quilliam; the respondent----, the co +respondent----. + +As Philip awoke from his doze, with the salt breath of the sea in his +nostrils and the songs of spring in his ears, Auntie Nan was fumbling +with the paper to get it back into the envelope. Her hands trembled, +and when she spoke her voice quivered. Philip saw in a moment what had +happened. She had stumbled into the pit where the secret of his life lay +buried. + +The doctor came in at that instant. He looked attentively at Auntie Nan, +and said significantly, “You have been nursing too long, Miss Christian, +you must go home for a while.” + +“I will go home at once,” she faltered, in a feeble inward voice. + +Philip's head was on his breast. Such was the first step on the Calvary +he intended to ascend. O God, help him! God support him! God bear up his +sinking feet that he might not fall from weakness, or fear, or shame. + + + + +XIII. + +Cæsar visited Kate at Castle Rushen. He found her lodged in a large and +light apartment (once the dining-room of the Lords of Man), indulged +with every comfort, and short of nothing but her liberty. As the turnkey +pulled the door behind him, Cæsar lifted both hands and cried, “The Lord +is my refuge and my strength; a very present help in trouble.” Then he +inquired if Pete had been there before him, and being answered “No,” he +said, “The children of this world are wiser in their generation than the +children of light.” After that he fell to the praise of the Deemster, +who had not only given Kate these mercies, comfortable to her carnal +body, if dangerous to her soul, but had striven to lighten the burden of +her people at the time when he had circulated the report of her death, +knowing she was dead indeed, dead in trespasses and sins, and choosing +rather that they should mourn her as one who was already dead in fact, +than feel shame for her as one that was yet alive in iniquity. + +Finally, he dropped his handkerchief on to the slate floor,-went down +on one knee by the side of his tall hat, and called on her in prayer +to cast in her lot afresh with the people of God. “May her lightness be +rebuked, O Lord!” he cried. “Give her to know that until she repents +she hath no place among Thy children. And, Lord, succour Thy servant in +his hour of tribulation. Let him be well girt up with Christian armour. +Help him to cry aloud, amid his tears and his lamentations, 'Though my +heart and hers should break, Thy name shall not be dishonoured, my Lord +and my God!'” + +Rising from his knee and dusting it, Cæsar took up his tall hat, and +left Kate as he had found her, crouching by the fire inside the wide +ingle of the old hall, covering her face and saying nothing. + +He was in this mood of spiritual exaltation as he descended the steps +into the Keep, and came upon a man in the dress of a prisoner sweeping +with a besom. It was Black Tom. Cæsar stopped in front of him, moved +his lips, lifted his face to the sky, shut both eyes, then opened them +again, and said in a voice of deep sorrow, “Aw, Thomas! Thomas Quilliam! +I'm taking grief to see thee, man. An ould friend, whose hand has rested +in my hand, and swilling the floor of a prison! Well, I warned thee +often. But thou wast ever stony ground, Thomas. And now thou must see +for thyself whether was I right that honesty is the better policy. Look +at thee, and look at me. The Lord has delivered me, and prospered me +even in temporal things. I have lands and I have houses. And what hast +thou thyself? Nothing but thy conscience and thy disgrace. Even thy very +clothes they have taken away from thee, and they would take thy hair +itself if thou had any.” + +Black Tom stood with feet flatly planted apart, rested himself on the +shank of his besom, and said, “Don't be playing cammag (shindy) with me, +Mr. Holy Ghoster. It isn't honesty that's making the diff'rance between +us at all--it's luck. You've won and I've lost, you've succeeded and +I've failed, you're wearing your chapel hat and I'm in this bit of a +saucepan lid, but you're only a reg'lar ould Pharisee, anyway.” + +Cæsar waved his hand. “I can't take the anger with thee, Thomas,” he +said, backing himself out. “I thought the devil had been chained since +our last camp-meeting, but I was wrong seemingly. He goeth about still +like a raging lion, seeking whom he may devour.” + +“Don't be trying to knock me down with your tex'es,” said Thomas, +shouldering his besom. “Any cock can crow on his own midden.” + +“You can't help it, Thomas,” said Cæsar, edging away. “It isn't my ould +friend that's blaspheming at all. It's the devil that has entered into +his heart and is rending him. But cast the devil out, man, or hell will +be thy portion.” + +“I was there last night in my dreams, Cæsar,” said Black Tom, following +him up. “'Oh, Lord Devil, let me in,' says I. 'Where d'ye come from?' +says he. 'The Isle of Man,' says I. 'I'm not taking any more from there +till my Bishop comes,' says he. 'Who's that?' says I. 'Bishop Cæsar, the +publican--who else?' says he.” + +“I marvel at thee, Thomas,” said Cæsar, half through the small door +of the portcullis, “but the sons of Belial have to fight hard for his +throne. I'll pray for thee, though, that it be not remembered against +thee when(D.V.) there will be weeping and wailing and gnashing of +teeth.” + +That night Cæsar visited the Deemster at Elm Cottage. His eyes +glittered, and there was a look of frenzy in his face. He was still in +his mood of spiritual pride, and when he spoke it was always with the +thees and the thous and in the high pitch of the preacher. + +“The Ballawhaine is dead, your Honour,” he cried, “They wouldn't have me +tell thee before because of thy body's weakness, but now they suffer it. +Groanings and moanings and 'stericks of torment! Ter'ble sir, ter'ble! +Took a notion he would have water poured out for him at the last. It +couldn't wash him clane, though. And shouting with his dying voice, +'I've sinned, O God, I've sinned!' Oh, I delivered my soul, sir; he can +clear me of that, anyway. 'Lay hould of a free salvation,' says I. 'I've +not lived a right life,' says he. 'Truth enough,' says I; 'you've lived +a life of carnal freedom, but now is the appointed time. Say, “Lord, +I belaive; help thou my unbelaife.”' 'Too late, Mr. Cregeen, too late,' +says he, and the word was scarce out of his mouth when he was key-cold +in a minute, and gone into the night of all flesh that's lost. Well, +it was his own son that killed him, sir; robbed him of every silver +sixpence and ruined him. The last mortgage he raised was to keep the +young man out of prison for forgery. Bad, sir, bad! To indulge a child +to its own damnation is bad. A human infirmity, though; and I'm feeling +for the poor sinner myself being tempted--that is to say inclining--but +thank the Lord for his strengthening arm----” + +“Is he buried?” asked Philip. + +“Buried enough, and a poor funeral too, sir,” said Cæsar, walking the +room with a proud step, the legs straightened, the toes conspicuously +turned out. “Driving rain and sleet, sir, the wind in the trees, the +grass wet to your calf, and the parson in his white smock under the +umbrella. Nobody there to spake of, neither; only myself and the tenants +mostly.” + +“Where was Ross?” + +“Gone, sir, without waiting to see his foolish ould father pushed under +the sod. Well, there was not much to wait for neither. The young man has +been a besom of fire and burnt up everything. Not so much left as would +buy a rope to hang him. And Ballawhaine is mine, sir; mine in a way of +spak-ing--my son-in-law's, anyway--and he has given me the right to have +and to hould it. Aw, a Sabbath time, sir; a Sabbath time. I made up my +mind to have it the night the man struck me in my own house in Sulby. He +betrayed my daughter at last, sir, and took her from her home, and then +her husband lent six thousand pounds on mortgage. 'Do what you like with +it,' said he, and I said to myself, 'The man shall starve; he shall be +a beggar; he shall have neither bread to eat, nor water to drink, nor a +roof to cover him.' And the moment the breath was out of the ould man's +body I foreclosed.” + +Philip was trembling from head to foot. “Do you mean,” he faltered, +“that that was your reason?” + +“It is the Lord's hand on a rascal,” said Cæsar, “and proud am I to be +the instrument of his vengeance. 'God moves in a mysterious way,' sir. +Oh, the Lord is opening His word more and more. And I have more to tell +thee, too. Balla-whaine would belong to thyself, sir, if every one had +his rights. It was thy grandfather's inheritance, and it should have +been thy father's, and it ought to be thine. Take it, sir, take it on +thy own terms; it is worth a matter of twelve thousand, but thou shalt +have it for nine, and pay for it when the Lord gives thee substance. +Thou hast been good to me and to mine, and especially to the poor lost +lamb who lies in the Castle to-night in her shame and disgrace. Little +did I think I should ever repay thee, though. But it is the Lord's +doings. It is marvellous in our eyes. 'Deep in unfathomable mines'----” + +Cæsar was pacing the room and speaking in tones of rapture. Philip, who +was sitting at the table, rose from it with a look of fear. + +“Frightful! frightful!” he muttered. “A mistake! a mistake!” + +“The Lord God makes no mistakes, sir,” cried Cæsar. + +“But what if it was not Ross----” began Philip. Cæsar paid no heed. + +“What if it was not Ross----” Cæsar glanced over his shoulder. + +“What if it was some one else----” said Philip. Cæsar stopped in front +of him. + +“Some one you have never thought of--some one you have respected and +even held in honour----” + +“Who, then?” said Cæsar huskily. + +“Mr. Cregeen,” said Philip, “it is hard for me to speak. I had not +intended to speak yet; but I should hold myself in horror if I were +silent now. You have been living in awful error. Whatever the cost, +whatever the consequences, you must not remain in that error a moment +longer. It was not Ross who took away your daughter.” + +“Who was it?” cried Cæsar. His voice had the sound of a cracked bell. + +Philip struggled hard. He tried to confess. His eyes wandered about the +walls. “As you have cherished a mistaken resentment,” he faltered, “so +you have nourished a mistaken gratitude.” + +“Who? who?” cried Cæsar, looking fixedly into Philip's face. + +Philip's rigid fingers were crawling over the papers on the table like +the claws of crabs. They touched the summons from the Chancery Court, +and he picked it up. + +“Read this,” he said, and held it out to Cæsar. + +Cæsar took it, but continued to look at Philip with eyes that were +threatening in their wildness. Philip felt that in a moment their +positions had been changed. He was the judge no longer, but only a +criminal at the bar of this old man, this grim fanatic, half-mad already +with religious mania. + +“The Lord of Hosts is mighty,” muttered Cæsar; and then Philip heard the +paper crinkle in his hand. + +Cæsar was feeling for his spectacles. When he had liberated them from +the sheath, he put them on the bridge of his nose upside down. With +the two glasses against the wrinkles of his forehead and his eyes still +uncovered, he held the paper at arm's length and tried to read it. Then +he took out his red print handkerchief to dust the spectacles. Fumbling +spectacles and sheath and handkerchief and paper in his trembling hands +together, he muttered again in a quavering voice, as if to fortify +himself against what he was to see, “The Lord of Hosts is mighty.” + +He read the paper at length, and there was no mistaking it. “Quilliam v. +Quilliam and Christian (Philip).” + +He laid the summons on the table, and returned his spectacles to their +sheath. His breathing made noises in his nostrils. “_Ugh cha nee!_” (woe +is me), he muttered. “_Ugh cha nee! Ugh cha nee!_” + +Then he looked helplessly around and said, “Depart from me, for I am a +sinful man, O Lord.” + +The vengeance that he had built up day by day had fallen in a moment +into ruins. His hypocrisy was stripped naked. “I see how it is,” he said +in a hoarse voice. “The Lord has de-ceaved me to punish me. It is the +public-house. Ye cannot serve God and mammon. What's gained on the +devil's back is lost under his belly. I thought I was a child of God, +but the deceitfulness of riches has choked the word. _Ugh cha nee! Ugh +cha nee!_ My prosperity has been like the quails, only given with the +intent of choking me. _Ugh cha nee!_” + +His spiritual pride was broken down. The Almighty had refused to be made +a tool of. He took up his hat and rolled his arm over it the wrong way +of the nap. Half-way to the door he paused. “Well, I'll be laving you; +good-day, sir,” he said, nodding his head slowly. “The Lord's been +knowing what you were all the time seemingly. But what's the use of His +knowing--He never tells on nobody. And I've been calling on sinners to +flee from the wrath, and He's been letting the devils make a mock at +myself! _Ugh cha nee! Ugh cha nee!_” + +Philip had slipped back in his chair, and his head had fallen forward' +on the table. He heard the old man go out; he heard his heavy step drop +slowly down the stairs; he heard his foot dragging on the path outside. +“_Ugh cha nee! Ugh cha nee!_” The word rang in his heart like a knell. + +Jem-y-Lord, who had been out in the town, came back in great excitement. + +“Such news, your Honour! Such splendid news!” + +“What is it?” said Philip, without lifting his head. + +“They're signing petitions all over the island, asking the Queen to +make you Governor.” + +“God in heaven!” said Philip; “that would be frightful.” + + + + +XIV. + +When Philip was fit to go out, they brought up a carriage and drove +him round the bay. The town had awakened from its winter sleep, and the +harbour was a busy and cheerful scene. More than a hundred men had come +from their crofts in the country, and were making their boats ready for +the mackerel-fishing at Kinsale. There was a forest of masts where the +flat hulls had been, the taffrails and companions were touched up with +paint, and the newly-barked nets were being hauled over the quay. + +“Good morning, Dempster,” cried the men. + +They all saluted him, and some of them, after their Manx fashion, drew +up at the carriage-door, lifted their caps with their tarry hands, and +said-- + +“Taking joy to see you out again, Dempster. When a man's getting over an +attack like that, it's middling clear the Lord's got work for him.” + +Philip answered with smiles and bows and cheerful words, but the +kindness oppressed him. He was thinking of Kate. She was the victim +of his success. For all that he received she had paid the penalty. He +thought of her dreams, her golden dreams, her dreams of going up side by +side and hand in hand with the man she loved. “Oh, my love, my love!” he +murmured. “Only a little longer.” + +The doctor was waiting for him when he reached home. + +“I have something to say to you, Deemster,” he said, with averted face. +“It's about your aunt.” + +“Is she ill?” said Philip.--“Very ill.” + +“But I've inquired daily.” + +“By her express desire the truth has been kept back from you.” + +“The carriage is still at the door----” began Philip. + +“I've never seen any one sink so rapidly. She's all nerve. No doubt the +nursing exhausted her.” + +“It's not that--I'll go up immediately.” + +“She was to expect you at five.” + +“I cannot wait,” said Philip, and in a moment he was on the road. “O +God!” he thought, “how steep is the path I have to tread.” + +On getting to Ballure, he pushed through the hall and stepped upstairs. +At the door of Auntie Nan's bedroom he was met by Martha, the housemaid, +now the nurse. She looked surprised, and made some nervous show of +shutting him out. Before she could dc so he was already in the room. The +air was heavy with the smell of medicines and vinegar and the odours of +sick life. + +“Hush!” said Martha, with a movement of lips and eyebrows. + +Auntie Nan was asleep in a half-sitting position on the bed. It was a +shock to see the change in her. The beautiful old face was white and +drawn with pain; the chin was hanging heavily; the eyes were half open; +there was no cap on her head; her hair was straggling loosely and was +dull as tow. + +“She must be very ill,” said Philip under his breath. + +“Very,” said Martha. “She wasn't expecting you until five, sir.” + +“Has the doctor told her? Does she know?” + +“Yes, sir; but she doesn't mind that. She knows she's dying, and +is quite resigned--quite--and quite cheerful--but she fears if you +knew--hush!” + +There was a movement on the bed. + +“She'll be shocked if she--and she's not ready to receive--in here, +sir,” whispered Martha, and she motioned to the back of a screen that +stood between the door and the bed. + +There was a deep sigh, a sound as of the moistening of dry lips, and +then the voice of Auntie Nan--not her own familiar voice, but a sort of +vanishing echo of it. “What is the time, Martha?” + +“Twenty minutes wanting five, ma'am.” + +“So late! It wasn't nice of you to let me sleep so long, Martha. I'm +expecting the Governor at five. What a mercy he hasn't come earlier. It +wouldn't be right to keep him waiting, and then--bring me the sponge, +girl. Moisten it first. Now the towel. The comb next. That's better. How +lifeless my hair is, though. Oil, you say? I wonder! I've never used it +in my life: but at a time like this--well, just a little, then--there, +that will do. Bring me a cap--the one with the pink bow in it. My face +is so pale--it will give me a little colour. That will do. You +couldn't tell I had been ill, could you? Not very ill, anyway? Now side +everything away. The medicines too--put them in the cupboard. So many +bottles. 'How ill she must have been!' he would say. And now open the +drawer on the left, Martha, the one with the key in it, and bring me +the paper on the top. Yes, the white paper. The folded one with the +endorsement. Endorsement means writing on the back, Martha. Ah! I've +lived all my life among lawyers. Lay it on the counterpane. The keys? +Lay them beside it. No, put them behind my pillow, just at my back. Yes, +there--lower, though, deeper still--that's right. Now set a chair, so +that he can sit beside me. This side of the bed--no, this side. Then the +light will be on him, and I will be able to see his face--my eyes are +not so good as they were, you know. A little farther back--not quite so +much, neither--that will do. Ah!” + +There was a long breath of satisfaction, and then Auntie Nan said-- + +“I suppose it's----what time is it now, Martha?” + +“Ten minutes wanting five, ma'am.” + +“Did you tell Jane about the cutlets? He likes them with bread-crumbs, +you know. I hope she won't forget to say 'Your Excellency.' I shall hear +his voice the moment he comes into the hall. My ears are no worse, if +my eyes are. Perhaps he won't speak, though, 'She's been so ill,' +he'll think. Martha, I think you had better open the door. Jane is so +forgetful. She might say things, too. If he asks, 'How is she to-day, +Martha'' you must answer quite brightly, 'Better to-day, your +Excellency.'” + +There was an exclamation of pain. + +“Oh! Ugh--Oo! Oh, blessed Lord Jesus!” + +“Are you sure you are well enough, ma'am? Hadn't I better tell him----” + +“No, I'll be worse to-morrow, and the next day worse still. Give me a +dose of medicine, Martha--the morning medicine--the one that makes me +cheerful. Thank you, Martha. If I feel the pain when he is here, I'll +bear it as long as I can, and then I'll say, 'I'm finding myself drowsy, +Philip; you had better go and lie down.' Will you understand that, +Martha?” + +“Yes, ma'am,” said Martha. + +“I'm afraid we must be a little deceitful, Martha. But we can't help +that, can we? You see he has to be installed yet, and that is always a +great excitement. If he thought I was very ill, now--_very_, very +ill, you know--yes, I really think he would wish to postpone it, and I +wouldn't have that for worlds and worlds. He has always been so fond +of his old auntie. Well, it's the way with these boys. I daresay people +wonder why he has never married, being so great and so prosperous. That +was for my sake. He knew I should----” + +Philip was breathing heavily. Auntie Nan listened. “I'm sure there's +somebody in the hall, Martha. Is it----? Yes, it's----; Go down to him +quick----” + +“Yes, ma'am,” said Martha, making a noise with the screen to cover +Philip's escape on tiptoe. Then she came to him on the landing, wiping +her eyes with her apron, and pretended to lead Philip back to the room. + +“My boy! my boy!” cried Auntie Nan, and she folded him in her arms. + +The transformation was wonderful. She had a look of youth now, almost +a look of gaiety. “I've heard the great, great news,” she whispered, +taking his hand. + +“That's only a rumour, Auntie,” said Philip. “Are you better?” + +“Oh, but it will come true. Yes, yes, I'm better. I'm sure it will come +true. And, dear heart, what a triumph! I dreamt it all the night before +I heard of it. You were on the top of the Tynwald, and there was a great +crowd. But come and sit down and tell me everything. So you are better +yourself? Quite strong again, dear? Oh, yes, any where, Philip-sit +anywhere. Here, this chair will do--this one by my side. Ah! How well +you look!” + +She was carried away by her own gaiety. Leaning back on the pillow, +but still keeping his hand in hers, she said, “Do you know, Philip +Christian, who is the happiest person in the world? I'm sure you don't, +for all you're so clever. So I'll tell you. Perhaps you think it's a +beautiful young wife just married to a husband who worships her. Well, +you're quite, quite wrong, sir. It's an old, old lady, very, very old, +and very feeble, just tottering on, and not expecting to live a great +while longer, but with her sons about her, grown up, and big, and +strong, and having all the world before them. That's the happiest person +on earth. And I'm the next thing to it, for my boy--my own boy's boy---” + +She broke off, and then, with a far-off look, she said, “I wonder will +he think I've done my duty!” + +“Who?” asked Philip. + +“Your father,” she answered. + +Then she turned to the maid and said, quite gaily, “You needn't wait, +Martha. His Excellency will call you when I want my medicine. Won't you, +your Excellency?” + +Philip could not find it in his heart to correct her again. The girl +left the room. Auntie Nan glanced at the closing door, then reached over +to Philip with an air of great mystery, and whispered-- + +“You mustn't be shocked, Philip, or surprised, or fancy I'm very ill, or +that I'm going to die; but what do you think I've done?” + +“Nay, what?” + +“I've made my will! Is that very terrible?” + +“You've done right, Auntie,” said Philip. + +“Yes, the High Bailiff has been up and everything is in order, every +little thing. See,” and she lifted the paper that the maid had laid on +the counterpane. “Let me tell you.” She nodded her head as she ran over +the items. “Some little legacies first, you know. There's Martha, such +a good girl--I've left her my silk dresses. Then old Mary, the housemaid +at Ballawhaine. Poor old thing! she's been down with rheumatism three +years, and flock beds get so lumpy--I've left her my feather one. I +thought at first I should like you to have my little income. Do you +know, your old auntie is quite an old miser. I've grown so fond of my +little money. And it seemed so sweet to think--but then you don't +want it now, Philip. It would be nothing to you, would it? I've been +thinking, though--now, what do you think I've been thinking of doing +with my little fortune?” + +Philip stroked the wrinkled fingers with his other hand. + +“What's right, I'm sure, Auntie. What is it?” + +“You would never guess.”--“No?” + +“I've been thinking,” with sudden gravity. “Philip, there's nobody in +the world so unhappy as a poor gentlewoman who has slipped and fallen. +Then this one's father, he has turned his back on her, they're telling +me, and of course she can't expect anything from her husband. I've been +thinking, now----” + +“Yes?” said Philip, with his eyes down. + +“To tell you the truth, I've been thinking it would be so nice----” + +And then, nervously, faltering, in a quavering voice, with many excuses, +out came the great secret, the mighty strategy. Auntie Nan had willed +her fortune to Kate. + +“You're an angel, Auntie,” said Philip in a thick voice. + +But he saw through her artifice. She was talking of Kate, but she was +thinking of himself. She was trying to relieve him of an embarrassment; +to remove an impediment that lay in his path; to liberate his +conscience; to cover up his fault; to conceal everything. + +“And then this house, dear,” said Auntie Nan. “It's yours, but you'll +never want it. It's been a dear little harbour of refuge, but the +storm is over now. Would you--do you see any objection--perhaps you +might--could you not let the poor soul come and live here with her +little one, after I--when all is over, I mean--and she is--eh?” + +Philip could not speak. He took the wrinkled hand and drew it up to his +lips. + +The old soul was beside herself with joy. “Then you're sure I've done +right? Quite sure? Lock it up in the drawer again, dearest The top +one on the left. Oh, the keys? Dear me, yes; where are the keys? How +tiresome! I remember now. They're at the back of my pillow. Will +you call Martha? Or perhaps you would yourself--will you?” (very +artfully)--“you don't mind then? Yes, that's it; more this way, though, +a little more--ah! My boy! my boy!” + +The old dove's second strategy had succeeded also. In fumbling behind +her pillow for the keys, Philip had to put his arms about her again, and +she was kissing him on the forehead and on the cheeks. + +Then came a spasm of pain. It dragged at her features, but her smile +struggled through it. She fetched a difficult breath, and said-- + +“And now--dear--I'm finding myself--a little drowsy--how selfish of +me--your cutlets--browned--nicely browned--breadcrumbs, you know----” + +Philip fled from the room and summoned Martha. He wandered aimlessly +about the house for hours that night. At one moment he found himself +in the blue room, Auntie Nan's workroom, so full of her familiar +things--the spinning-wheel, the frame of the sampler, the old-fashioned +piano, the scent of lavender--all the little evidences of her presence, +so dainty, so orderly, so sweet A lamp was burning for the convenience +of the doctor, but there was no fire. + +The doctor came again towards ten o'clock. There was nothing to be done; +nothing to be hoped; still she might live until morning, if---- + +At midnight Philip crept noiselessly to the bedroom. The condition was +unaltered. He was going to lie down, but wished to be awakened if there +was any change. + +It was long before he dropped off, and he seemed to have slept only a +moment when there was a knocking at his door. He heard it while he +was still sleeping. The dawn had broken, the streamers of the sun were +rising out of the sea. A sparrow in the garden was hacking the air with +its monotonous chirp. + +Auntie Nan was far spent, yet the dragging expression of pain was gone, +and a serenity almost angelic overspread her face. When she recognised +Philip she felt for his hand, guided it to her heart, and kept it there. +Only a few words did she speak, for her breath was short. She commended +her soul to God. Then, with a look of pallid sunshine, she beckoned +to Philip. He stooped his ear to her lips, and she whispered, “Hush, +dearest! Never tell any one, for nobody ever knew--ever dreamt--but I +loved your father--and--_God gave him to me in you._” + +The dear old dove had delivered herself of her last great secret. Philip +put his lips to her cheek, iced already over the damps and chills of +death. Then the eyes closed, the sweet old head slid back, the lips +changed their colour, but still lay open as with a smile. Thus died +Auntie Nan, peacefully, hopefully, trustfully, almost joyfully, in the +fulness of her love and of her pride. + +“O God,” thought Philip, “let me go on with my task. Give me strength to +withstand the temptation of love like this.” + +Her love had tempted him all his life His father had been twenty years +dead, but she had kept his spirit alive--his aims, his ambitions, his +fears, and the lessons of his life. There lay the beginnings of his +ruin, his degradation, and the first cause of his deep duplicity. He +had recovered everything that had been lost; he had gained all that +his little world could give; and what was the worth of it? What was the +price he had paid for it? “What shall it profit a man if he gain the +whole world and lose his own soul?” + +Philip put his lips to the cold forehead. “Sweet soul, forgive me! God +strengthen me! Let me not fail at this last moment.” + + + + +XV. + +Philip did not go back to Elm Cottage. He buried Auntie Nan at the foot +of his father's grave. There was no room at either side, his mother's +sunken grave being on the left and the railed tomb of his grandfather on +the right. They had to remove a willow two feet nearer to the path. + +When all was over he returned home alone, and spent the afternoon in +gathering up Auntie Nan's personal belongings, labelling some of them +and locking them up in the blue room. The weather had been troubled +for some days. Spots had been seen on the sun. There were magnetic +disturbances, and on the night before the aurora had pulsed in the +northern sky. When the sun was near to sinking there was a brilliant +lower sky to the west, with a bank of rolling cloud above it like a +thick thatch roof, and a shaft of golden light dipping down into the +sea, as if an angel had opened a door in heaven. After the sun had gone +a fiery red bar stretched across the sky, and there were low rumblings +of thunder. + +Pausing in his work to look out on the beach, Philip saw a man riding +hard on horseback. It was a messenger from Government Offices. He +drew up at the gate. A moment later the messenger was in Philip's room +handing him a letter. + +If anybody had seen the Deemster as he took that letter he must have +thought it his death-warrant. A deadly pallor came to his face when +he broke the seal of the envelope and drew out the contents. It was a +commission from the Home Office. Philip was appointed Governor of the +Isle of Man. “My punishment, my punishment!” he thought. The higher +he rose, the lower he had to fall. It was a cruel kindness, a painful +distinction, an awful penalty. Truly the steps of this Calvary were +steep. Would he ever ascend it? + +The messenger was bowing and smirking before him. “Thousand +congratulations, your Excellency!” + +“Thank you, my lad. Go downstairs. They'll give you something to eat.” + +A moment later Jem-y-Lord came into the room on some pretence and hopped +about like a bird. “Yes, your Excellency--No, your Excellency--Quite so, +your Excellency.” + +Martha came next, and met Philip on the landing with a courageous smile +and a courtesy. And the whole house, lately so dark and sad, seemed to +lighten and to laugh, as when, after a sleepless night, you look, +and lo! the daylight is on the blind; you listen and the birds are +twittering in their cages below the stairs. + +“_She_ will hear it too,” thought Philip. + +He wrote her two lines of a letter, the first that he had penned since +his illness-- + + “Keep up heart, dear; I will be with you soon.” + +This, without signature or superscription, he put into an envelope, and +addressed. Then he went out and posted it himself. + +There was lightning as he returned. He felt as if he would like to +wander away in it down to Port Mooar, and round by the caves, and under +the cliffs, where the sea-birds scream. + + + + +XVI. + +The night had fallen, and he was sitting in his room, when there was +a clamour of loud voices in the hall. Some one was calling for the +Deemster. It was Nancy Joe. She was newly returned from Sulby. Something +had happened to Cæsar, and nobody could control him. + +“Go to him, your Honour,” she cried from the doorway. “It's only +yourself that has power with him, and we don't know in the world what's +doing on the man. He's got a ram's horn at him, and is going blowing +round the house like the mischief, calling on the Lord to bring it down, +and saying it's the walls of Jericho.” + +Philip sent for a carriage, and set off for Sulby immediately. The storm +had increased by this time. Loud peals of thunder echoed in the hills. +Forks of lightning licked the trunks of the trees and ran like serpents +along the branches. As they were going by the church at Lezayre, the +coachman reached over from the box, and said, “There's something going +doing over yonder, sir. See?” + +A bright gleam lit up the dark sky in the direction they were taking. At +the turn of the road by the “Ginger,” somebody passed them running. + +“What's yonder?” called the coachman. + +And a voice out of the darkness answered him, “The 'Fairy' is struck by +lightning, and Cæsar's gone mad.” + +It was the fact. While Cæsar in his mania had been blowing his ram's +horn around his public-house under the delusion that it was Jericho, the +lightning had struck it. The fire was past all hope of subduing. A great +hole had been burnt into the roof, and the flames were leaping through +it as through a funnel. All Sulby seemed to be on the spot. Some were +dragging furniture out of the burning house; others were running with +buckets to the river and throwing water on the blazing thatch. + +But encircling everything was the figure of a man going round and +round with great plunging strides, over the road, across the river, +and through the mill-pond behind, blowing a horn in fierce, unearthly +blasts, and crying in a voice of triumph and mockery, first to this +worker and then to that, “No use, I tell thee. Thou can never put it +out. It's fire from heaven. Didn't I say I'd bring it down?” + +It was Cæsar. His eyes glittered, his mouth worked convulsively, and his +cheeks were as black with the flying soot as the “colley” of the pot. + +When he saw Philip, he came up to him with a terrible smile on his +fierce black face, and, pointing to the house, he cried above the babel +of voices, the roar of the thunder, and crackle of the fire, “An unclean +spirit lived in it, sir. It has been tormenting me these ten years.” + +He seemed to listen and to hear something. “That's it roaring,” he +cried, and then he laughed with wild delight. + +“Compose yourself, Mr. Cregeen,” said Philip, and he tried to take him +by the arm. + +But Cæsar broke away, blew a terrific blast on his ram's horn, and went +striding round the house again. When he came back the next time +there was a deep roll of thunder in the air, and he said, “It's the +Ballawhaine. He had the stone five years, and he used to groan so.” + +Again Philip entreated him to compose himself. It was useless. Round and +round the burning house he went, blowing his horn, and calling on the +workers to stop their ungodly labour, for the Lord had told him to blow +down the walls of Jericho, and he had burnt them down instead. + +The people began to be afraid of his frenzy. “They'll have to put the +man in the Castle,” said one. “Or have him chained up in an outhouse,” + said another. “They kept the Kirk Maug-hold lunatic fifteen years on the +straw in the gable loft, and his children in the house grew up to be men +and women.” “It's the girl that's doing on Cæsar. Shame on the daughters +that bring ruin to their old fathers!” + +Still Cæsar went careering round the fire, blowing his ram's horn and +crying, “No use! It's the Lord God!” + +The more the fire blazed, the more it resisted the efforts of the people +to subdue it, the more fierce and unearthly were Cæsar's blasts and the +more triumphant his cries. + +At last Grannie stepped out and stopped him. “Come home, father,” she +whimpered. He looked at her with bewildered eyes, then he looked at the +burning house, and he seemed to recover himself in a moment. + +“Come home, bogh,” said Grannie tenderly. + +“I've got no home,” said Cæsar in a helpless way. “And I've got no +money. The fire has taken all.” + +“No matter, father,” said Grannie. “We had nothing when we began; we'll +begin again.” + +Then Cæsar fell to mumbling texts of Scripture, and Grannie to soothing +him after her simple fashion. + +“'My soul is passing through deep waters. I am feeble and sore broken. +Save me, O God, for the waters are come in unto my soul, I sink in deep +mire, where there is no standing.'” + +“Aw, no Cæsar, we're on the road now. It's dry enough here, anyway.” + +“'Many bulls have compassed me; great bulls of Bashan have beset me +round. Save me from the lion's mouth; for Thou hast heard me from the +horns of the unicorn.'” + +“Never mind the lion and the unicorn, father, but come and we'll change +thy wet trousers.” + +“'Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be +whiter than snow.'” + +“Aw, yes, we'll wash thee enough when we get to Ramsey. Come, then, +bogh.” + +He had dropped his ram's horn somewhere, and she took him by the hand. +Then he suffered himself to be led away, and the two old children went +off into the darkness. + + + + +XVII. + +There was a letter waiting for Philip at home. It was from the Clerk of +the Rolls. Only a few lines scribbled on the back of a draft deposition, +telling him the petition for divorce had been heard that day within +closed doors. The application had been granted, and all was settled and +comfortable. + +“I don't want to hurt your already much wounded feelings, Christian,” + wrote the Clerk of the Rolls, “or to add anything to your responsibility +when you come to make provision for the woman, but I must say she has +given up for your sake a deuced good honest fellow.” + +“I know it,” said Philip aloud. + +“When I told him that all was over, and that his erring wife would +trouble him no more, I thought he was going to burst out crying.” + +But Philip had no time yet to think of Pete. All his heart was with +Kate. She would receive the official intimation of the divorce, and it +would fall on her in her prison like a blow. She would think of herself, +with all the world against her, and of him with all the world at his +feet. He wanted to run to her, to pluck her up in his arms, to kiss her +on the lips, and say, “Mine, mine at last!” His wife--her husband--all +forgiven--all forgotten! + +Philip spent the rest of the night in writing a letter to Kate. He told +her he could not live without her; that now for the first time she was +his, and he was hers, and they were one; that their love was re-born, +and that he would spend the future in atoning for the wrongs he had +inflicted upon her in the past. Then he dropped to the sheer babble of +affection and poured out his heart to her--all the babydom of love, the +foolish prattle, the tender nonsense. What matter that he was Governor +now, and the first man in the island? He forgot all about it. What +matter that he was writing to a fallen woman in prison? He only +remembered it to forget himself the more. + +“Just a little longer, my love, just a little longer. I am coming to +you, I am coming. Older, perhaps, perhaps sadder, and a boy no more, but +hopeful still, and ready to face whatever fate befall, with her I love +beside me.” + +Next day Jem-y-Lord took this letter to Castle Rushen and brought back +an answer. It was one line only--“My darling! At last! At last! Oh, +Philip! Philip! _But what about our child?_” + + + + +XVIII. + +The proclamation of Philip's appointment as Governor of the Isle of +Man had been read in the churches, and nailed up on the doors of the +Court-houses, and the Clerk of the Rolls was pushing on the arrangements +for the installation. + +“Let it be on the Tuesday of Easter week,” he wrote, “and of course at +Castle Rushen. The retiring Governor is ready to return for that day to +deliver up his seals of office and to receive your commission.” + +“P. S.--Private. And if you think that soft-voiced girl has been long +enough 'At Her Majesty's pleasure,' I will release her. Not that she +is taking any harm at all, but we had better get these little accounts +squared off before your great day comes. Meantime you may wish to +provide for her future. Be liberal, Christian; you can afford to treat +her liberally. But what am I saying? Don't I know that you will be +ridiculously over-generous?” + +Philip answered this letter promptly. “The Tuesday of Easter week will +do as well as any other day. As to the lady, let her stay where she +is until the morning of the ceremony, when I will myself settle +everything.” + +Philip's correspondence was now plentiful, and he had enough work +to cope with it The four towns of the island vied with each other in +efforts to show him honour. Douglas, as the scene of his career, wished +to entertain him at a banquet; Ramsey, as his birthplace, wanted to +follow him in procession. He declined all invitations. + +“I am in mourning,” he wrote. “And besides, I am not well.” + +“Ah! no,” he thought, “nobody shall reproach me when the times comes.” + +There was no pause, no pity, no relenting rest in the world's kindness. +It began to take shapes of almost fiendish cruelty in his mind, as if +the devil's own laughter was behind it. + +He inquired about Pete. Hardly anybody knew anything; hardly anybody +cared. The spendthrift had come down to his last shilling, and sold up +the remainder of his furniture. The broker was to empty the house on +Easter Tuesday. That was all. Not a word about the divorce. The poor +neglected victim, forgotten in the turmoil of his wrongdoer's glory, +had that last strength of a strong man--the strength to be silent and to +forgive. + +Philip asked about the child. She was still at Elm Cottage in the care +of the woman with the upturned nose and the shrill voice. Every night +he devised plans for getting possession of Kate's little one, and +every morning he abandoned them, as difficult or cruel or likely to be +spurned. + +On Easter Monday he was busy in his room at Ballure, with a mounted +messenger riding constantly between his gate and Government offices. He +had spent the morning on two important letters. Both were to the Home +Secretary. One was sealed with his seal as Deemster; the other was +written on the official paper of Government House. He was instructing +the messenger to register these letters when, through the open door, +he heard a formidable voice in the hall. It was Pete's voice. A moment +afterwards Jem-y-Lord came up with a startled face. + +“He's here himself, your Excellency. Whatever _am_ I to do with him?” + +“Bring him up,” said Philip. + +Jem began to stammer. “But--but--and then the Bishop may be here any +minute.” + +“Ask the Bishop to wait in the room below.” + +Pete was heard coming upstairs. “Aisy all, aisy! Stoop your lil head, +bogh. That's the ticket!” + +Philip had not spoken to Pete since the night of the drinking of the +brandy and water in the bedroom. He could not help it--his hand shook. +There would be a painful scene. + +“Stoop again, darling. There you are.” + +And then Pete was in the room. He was carrying the child on one +shoulder; they were both in their best clothes. Pete looked older and +somewhat thinner; the tan of his cheeks was fretted out in pale patches +under the eyes, which were nevertheless bright. He had the face of a +man who had fought a brave fight with life and been beaten, yet bore the +world no grudge. Jem-y-Lord and the messenger were gone from the room in +a moment, and the door was closed. + +“What d'ye think of that, Phil? Isn't she a lil beauty?” + +Pete was dancing the child on his knee and looking sideways down at it +with eyes of rapture. + +“She's as sweet as an angel,” said Philip in a low tone. + +“Isn't she now?” said Pete, and then he rattled on as if he were the +happiest man alive. “You've been wanting something like this yourself +this long time, Phil. 'Deed you have, though. It would be diverting you +wonderful. Ter'ble the fun there is in babies. Talk about play-actorers! +They're only funeral mutes where babies come. Bittending this and +bittending that--it's mortal amusing they are. You'd be getting up from +your books, tired shocking, and ready for a bit of fun, and going to the +stair-head and shouting down, 'Where's my lil woman?' Then up she'd be +coming, step by step, houlding on to the bannisters, dot and carry one. +And my gracious, the dust there'd be here in the study! You down on +the carpet on all fours, and the lil one straddled across your back and +slipping down to your neck. Same for all the world as the man in the +picture with the world atop of his shoulders. And your own lil world +would be up there, too, laughing and crowing mortal. And then at night, +Phil, at night--getting up from your summonses and your warrantees, and +going creeping to the lil one's room tippie-toe, tippie-toe, and 'Is +she sleeping comfor'bly?' thinks you; and listening at the crack of the +door, and hearing her breathing, and slipping in to look, and everything +quiet, and the red fire on her lil face, and 'Grod bless her, the +darling!' says you, and then back to your desk content. Aw, you'll have +to be having a lil one of your own one of these days, Phil.” + +“He has come to say something,” thought Philip. + +The child wriggled off Pete's knee and began to creep about the floor. +Philip tried to command himself and to talk easily. + +“And how have you been yourself, Pete?” he asked. + +“Well,” said Pete, meddling with his hair, “only middling, somehow.” + He looked down at the carpet, and faltered, “You'll be wondering at +me, Phil, but, you see “--he hesitated--“not to tell you a word of a +lie----” then, with a rush, “I'm going foreign again; that's the fact.” + +“Again?” + +“Well, I am,” said Pete, looking ashamed. “Yes, truth enough, that's +what I'm thinking of doing. You see,” with a persuasive air, “when a +man's bitten by travel it's like the hydrophobia ezactly, he can't rest +no time in one bed at all. Must be running here and running there--and +running reg'lar. It's the way with me, anyway. Used to think the ould +island would be big enough for the rest of my days. But, no! I'm longing +shocking for the mines again, and the compound, and the niggers, and +the wild life out yonder. 'The sea's calling me,' you know.” And then he +laughed. + +Philip understood him--Pete meant to take himself out of the way. “Shall +you stay long?” he faltered. + +“Well, yes, I was thinking so,” said Pete. “You see, the stuff isn't +panning out now same as it used to, and fortunes aren't made as fast +as they were in my time. Not that I'm wanting a fortune, neither--is +it likely now? But, still and for all--well, I'll be away a good spell, +anyway.” + +Philip tried to ask if he intended to go soon. + +“To-morrow, sir, by the packet to Liverpool, for the sailing on +Wednesday. I've been going the rounds saying 'goodbye' to the ould +chums--Jonaique, and John the Widow, and Niplightly, and Kelly the +postman. Not much heart at some of them; just a bit of a something +stowed away in their giblets; but it isn't right to be expecting too +much at all. This is the only one that doesn't seem willing to part with +me.” + +Pete's dog had followed him into the room, and was sitting soberly by +the side of his chair. “There's no shaking him off, poor ould chap.” + +The dog got up and wagged his stump. + +“Well, we've tramped the world together, haven't we, Dempster? He +doesn't seem tired of me yet neither.” Pete's face lengthened. “But +there's Grannie, now. The ould angel is going about like a bit of a +thunder-cloud, and doesn't know in the world whether to burst on me or +not. Thinks I've been cruel, seemingly. I can't be explaining to her +neither. Maybe you'll set it right for me when I'm gone, sir. It's you +for a job like that, you know. Don't want her to be thinking hard of me, +poor ould thing.” + +Pete whistled at the child, and halloed to it, and then, in a lower +tone, he continued, “Not been to Castletown, sir. Got as far as +Ballasalla, and saw the castle tower. Then my heart was losing me, and +I turned back. You'll say good-bye for me, Phil Tell her I forgave--no, +not that, though. Say I left her my love--that won't do neither. +_You'll_ know best what to say when the time comes, Phil, so I lave it +with you. Maybe you'll tell her I went away cheerful and content, and, +well, happy--why not? No harm in saying that at all. Not breaking my +heart, anyway, for when a man's a man--H'm!” clearing his throat, “I'm +bad dreadful these days wanting a smook in the mornings. May I smook +here? I may? You're good, too.” + +He cut his tobacco with his discoloured knife, rolled it, charged his +pipe, and lit it. + +“Sorry to be going away just before your own great day, Phil. I'll get +the skipper to fire a round as we're steaming by Castletown, and if +there's a band aboord I'll tip them a trifle to play 'Myle Charaine.' +That'll spake to you like the blackbird's whistle, as the saying is. +Looks like deserting you, though. But, chut! it would be no surprise +to me at all. I've seen it coming these years and years. 'You'll be +the first Manxman living,' says I the day I sailed before. You've not +deceaved me neither. D'ye remember the morning on the quay, and the oath +between the pair of us? Me swearing you same as a high bailiff--nothing +and nobody to come between us--d'ye mind it, Phil? And nothing has, and +nothing shall.” + +He puffed at his pipe, and said significantly, “You'll be getting +married soon. Aw, you will, I know you will, I'm sarten sure you will.” + +Philip could not look into his face. He felt little and mean. + +“You're a wise man, sir, and a great man, but if a plain common chap may +give you a bit of advice--aw, but you'll be losing no time, though, +I'll not be here myself to see it. I'll be on the water, maybe, with the +waves washing agen the gun'ale, and the wind rattling in the rigging, +and the ship burrowing into the darkness of the sea. But I'll be +knowing it's morning at home, and the sun shining, and a sort of a warm +quietness everywhere, and you and her at the ould church together.” + +The pipe was puffing audibly. + +“Tell her I lave her my blessing. Tell her--but the way I'm smooking, +it's shocking. Your curtains will be smelling thick twist for a +century.” + +Philip's moist eyes were following the child along the floor. + +“What about the little one?” he asked with difficulty. + +“Ah I tell you the truth, Phil, that's the for I came. Well, mostly, +anyway. You see, a child isn't fit for a compound ezactly. Not but +they're thinking diamonds of a lil thing out there, specially if it's a +girl. But still and for all, with niggers about and chaps as rough as a +thornbush and no manners to spake of----” + +Philip interrupted eagerly--“Will you leave her with Grannie!” + +“Well, no, that wasn't what I was thinking. Grannie's a bit ould getting +and she's had her whack. Wanting aisement in her ould days, anyway. +Then she'll be knocking under before the lil one's up--that's only to be +expected. No, I was thinking--what d'ye think I was thinking now?” + +“What?” said Philip with quick-coming breath. He did not raise his head. + +“I was thinking--well, yes, I was, then--it's a fact, though--I was +thinking maybe yourself, now----” + +“Pete!” + +Philip had started up and grasped Pete by the hand, but he could say no +more, he felt crushed by Pete's magnanimity. And Pete went on as if +he were asking a great favour. “'She's been your heart's blood to you, +Pete,' thinks I to my-. self, 'and there isn't nobody but himself you +could trust her with--nobody else you would give her up to. He'll love +her,'. thinks I; 'he'll cherish her; he'll rear her as if she was his +own; he'll be same thing as a father itself to her'----” + +Philip was struggling to keep up. + +“I've been laving something for her too,” said Pete. + +“No, no!” + +“Yes, though, one of the first Manx estates going. Cæsar had the deeds, +but I've been taking them to the High Bailiff, and doing everything +regular. When I'm gone, sir----” + +Philip tried to protest. + +“Aw, but a man can lave what he likes to his own, sir, can't he?” + +Philip was silent. He could say nothing. The make-believe was to be kept +up to the last tragic moment. + +“And out yonder, lying on my hunk in the sheds--good mattresses and +thick blankets, Phil, nothing to complain of at all--I'll be watching +her growing up, year by year, same as if she was under my eye constant. +'She's in pinafores now' thinks I. 'Now she's in long frocks, and is +doing up her hair.' 'She's as straight as an osier now, and red as a +rose, and the best looking girl in the island, and the spitting picture +of what her mother used to be.' Aw, I'll be seeing her in my mind's eye, +sir, plainer nor any potegraph.” + +Pete puffed furiously at his pipe. “And the mother, I'll be seeing +herself, too. A woman every inch of her, God bless her. Wherever there's +a poor girl lying in her shame she'll be there, I'll go bail on that. +And yourself--I'll be seeing yourself, sir, whiter, maybe, and the sun +going down on you, but strong for all. And when any poor fellow has had +a knock-down blow, and the world is darkening round him, he'll be coming +to you for light and for strength, and you'll be houlding out the right +hand to him, because you're knowing yourself what it is to fall and get +up again, and because you're a man, and Grod has made friends with you.” + +Pete rammed his thumb into his pipe, and stuffed it, still smoking, into +his waistcoat pocket. “Chut!” he said huskily. “The talk a man'll be +putting out when he's going away foreign! All for poethry then, or +something of that spacious. H'm! h'm!” clearing his throat, “must be +giving up the pipe, though. Not much worth for the voice at all.” + +Philip could not speak. The strength and grandeur of the man overwhelmed +him. It cut him to the heart that Pete could never see, could never +hear, how he would wash away his shame. + +The child had crawled across the room to an open cabinet that stood in +one corner, and there possessed herself of a shell, which she was making +show of holding to her ear. + +“Well, did you ever?” cried Pete. “Look at that child now. She's knowing +it's a shell. 'Deed she is, though. Aw, crawling reg'lar, sir, morning +to night. Would you like to see the prettiest sight in the world, Phil?” + He went down on his knees and held out his arms. “Come here, you lil +sandpiper. Fix that chair a piece nearer, sir--that's the ticket. Good +thing Nancy isn't here. She'd be on to us like the mischief. Wonderful +handy with babies, though, and if anybody was wanting a nurse now--a +stepmother's breath is cold--but Nancy! My gough, you daren't look over +the hedge at her lammie but she's shouting fit for an earth wake. Stand +nice, now, Kitty, stand nice, bogh! The woman's about right, too--the +lil one's legs are like bits of qualebone. 'Come, now, bogh, come?” + +Pete put the child to stand with its back to the chair, and then leaned +towards it with his arms outspread. The child staggered a step in +the sea of one yard's space that lay between, looked back at the +irrecoverable chair, looked down on the distant ground, and then plunged +forward with a nervous laugh, and fell into Pete's arms. + +“Bravo! Wasn't that nice, Phil? Ever see anything prettier than a +child's first step? Again, Kitty, bogh! But go to your _new_ father this +time. Aisy, now, aisy!” (in a thick voice). “Grive me a kiss first!” + (with a choking gurgle). “One more, darling!” (with a broken laugh). +“Now face the _other_ way. One--two--are you ready, Phil?” + +Phil held out his long white trembling hands. + +“Yes,” with a smothered sob. + +“Three--four--and away!” + +The child's fingers slipped into Philip's palm; there was another +halt, another plunge, another nervous laugh, and then the child was +in Philip's arms, his head was over it, and he was clasping it to his +heart. + +After a moment, Philip, without raising his eyes, said, “Pete!” + +But Pete had stolen softly from the room. + +“Pete! where are you?” + +Where was he? He was on the road outside, crying like a boy--no, like a +man--at thought of the happiness he had left upstairs. + + + + +XIX. + +The town of Peel was in a great commotion that night. It was the night +of St. Patrick's Day, and the mackerel fleet were leaving for Kinsale. +A hundred and fifty boats lay in the harbour, each with a light in its +binnacle, a fire in its cabin, smoke coming from its stove-pipe, and +its sails half-set. The sea was fresh; there was a smart breeze from the +northwest, and the air was full of the brine. At the turn of the tide +the boats began to drop down the harbour. Then there was a rush of women +and children and old men to the end of the pier. Mothers were seeing +their sons off, women their husbands, children their fathers, girls +their boys--all full of fun and laughter and joyful cries. + +One of the girls remembered that the men were leaving the island before +the installation of the new Governor. Straightway they started a game of +make-believe--the make-believe of electing the Governor for themselves. + +“Who are you voting for, Mr. Quayle?”--“Aw, Dempster Christian, of +coorse.”--“Throw us your rope, then, and we'll give you a pull.”--“Heave +oh, girls.” And the rope would be whipped round a mooring-post on the +quay, twenty girls would seize it, and the boat would go slipping past +the pier, round the castle rocks, and then away before the north-wester +like a gull. + +“Good luck, Harry!”--“Whips of money coming home, Jem!”--“Write us a +letter--mind you write, now Î “--“Goodnight, father!” + +No crying yet, no sign of tears--nothing but fresh young faces, bright +eyes, and peals of laughter, as one by one the boats slid out into the +fresh, green water of the bay, and the wind took them, and they shot +into the night. Even the dogs on the quay frisked about, and barked as +if they were going crazy with delight. + +In the midst of this happy scene, a man, wearing a monkey-jacket and a +wide-brimmed soft hat, came up to the harbour with a little misshapen +dog at his heels. He stood for a moment as if bewildered by the strange +midnight spectacle before him. Then he walked through the throng of +young people, and listened awhile to their talk and laughter. No one +spoke to him, and he spoke to no one. His dog followed with its nose at +his ankles. If some other dog, in youthful frolic, frisked and barked +about it, it snarled and snapped, and then croodled down at his master's +feet and looked ashamed. + +“Dempster, Dempster, getting a bit ould, eh?” said the man. + +After a little while he went quietly away. Nobody missed him; nobody had +observed him. He had gone back to the town. At a baker's shop, which +was still open for the convenience of the departing fleet, he bought +a seaman's biscuit. With this he returned to the harbour by way of the +shore. At the slip by the Rocket House he went down to the beach and +searched among the shingle until he found a stone like a dumb-bell, +large at the ends and narrow in the middle. Then he went back to the +quay. The dog followed him and watched him. + +The last of the boats was out in the bay by this time. She could be seen +quite plainly in the moonlight, with the green blade of a wave breaking +on her quarter. Somebody was carrying a light on her deck, and the giant +shadow of a man's figure was cast up on the new lugsail. There were +shouts and answers across the splashing water. Then a fresh young voice +on the boat began to sing “Lovely Mona, fare thee well.” The women took +it up, and the two companies sang it in turns, verse by verse, the women +on the quay and the men on the boat, with the sea growing wider between +them. + +An old fisherman on the skirts of the crowd had a little girl on his +shoulder. + +“You'll not be going to Kinsale this time, mate?” said a voice behind +him. + +“Aw, no, sir. I've seen the day, though. Thirty years I was going, and +better. But I'm done now.” + +“Well, that's the way, you see. It's the turn of the young ones now. +Let them sing, God bless them! We're not going to fret, though, are we? +There's one thing we can always do--we can always remember, and that's +some constilation, isn't it.” + +“I'm doing it reg'lar.” said the old fisherman. + +“After all, it's been a good thing to live, and when a man's time comes +it'll not be such a darned bad thing to die neither. Don't you hould +with me there, mate?” + +“I do, sir, I do.” + +The last boat had rounded the castle rock, and its topsail had +diminished and disappeared. On the quay the song had ended, and the +women and children were turning their faces with a shade of sadness +towards the town. + +“Well,” with a deep universal inspiration, “wasn't it beautiful?”-- +“Wasn't it?”--“Then what are you crying about?” + +The girls laughed at each other with wet eyes, and went off with +springless steps. The mothers picked up their children and carried them +home whimpering; and the old men went a way with drooping heads and +shambling feet. + +When all was gone, and the harbour-master had taken his last look round, +the man with the dog went to the end of the empty quay, and sat on the +mooring post that had served for the running of the ropes. All was quiet +enough now. The voices, the singing, the laughter were lost. There was +no sound but the gurgle of the ebbing tide, which was racing out with +the river's flow between the pier and the castle rock. + +The man looked at his dog, stooped to it, gave it the biscuit, and +petted it and stroked it while it munched its supper. “Dempster, bogh! +Dempster! Getting ould, eh? Travelled far together, haven't we? Tired a +bit, aren't you? Couldn't go through another rough journey, anyway. Hard +to part, though, Machree! Machree!” + +He took the stone out of his pocket, tied it to one end of the string, +made a noose on the ether end, slipped it about the dog's neck, and +without warning, picked up the dog and stone at once, and dropped them +over the pier. The old creature gave a piteous cry as it descended; +there was a splash, and then--the racing of the water past the pier. + +The man had turned away quickly, and was going heavily along the quay. + + + + +XX. + +It had been a night of pain to Philip. All the world seemed to be +conspiring to hold him back from what he had to do. “Thou shalt not” + was the legend that appeared to be written everywhere. Four persons +had learnt his secret, and all four seemed to call upon him to hide it. +First, the Clerk of the Rolls, who had heard the divorce proceedings +within closed doors; next Pete, who might have clamoured the scandal +on all hands, and plucked him down from his place, but had chosen to be +silent and to slip away unseen; then Cæsar, whose awful self-deception +was an assurance of his secrecy; and, finally. Auntie Nan, whose +provision for Kate's material welfare had been intended to prevent the +necessity for revelation. All these had seemed to say to him, whether +from affection or from fear, “Hold your peace. Say nothing. The past is +the past; it is dead; it does not exist. Go on with your career. It is +only beginning. What right have you to break it up? The island looks to +you, waits for you. Step forward and be strong.” + +Thank God, it was too late to be moved by that temptation. Too late to +be bought by that bribe. Already he had taken the irrevocable course, he +had made the irrevocable step. He could not now go back. + +But the awful penalty of the island's undeceiving! The pain of that +moment when everybody would learn that he had deceived the whole world! +He was a sham--a whited sepulchre. Every step he had gone up in his +quick ascent had been over the body of some one who had loved him too +well. First Kate, who had been the victim of the Deemstership, and now +Pete, who was paying the price that made him Governor. + +He could see the darkened looks of the proud; he could hear the +execration of the disappointed; he could feel the tears of the +true-hearted at the downfall of a life that had looked so fair. In the +frenzy of that last hour of trial, it seemed as if he was contending, +not with man and the world, but with the devil, who was using both to +make this bitter irony of his position--who was bribing him with worldly +glory that he might damn his soul forever. + +And therein lay a temptation that sat closer at his side--the temptation +to turn his face and fly away. It was midnight. The moon was shining on +the boundless plain of the sea. He was in the slack water of the soul, +when the ebb is spent, before the tide has begun to flow. Oh, to leave +everything behind--the shame and the glory together! + +It was the moment when the girls on Peel Quay were pulling the rope for +the men on the boats who were ready to vote for Christian. + +The pains of sleep were yet greater. He thought he was in Castletown, +skulking under the walls of the castle. With a look up towards +Parliament House and down to the harbour, he fumbled his private key +into the lock of the side entrance to the council chamber. The +old caretaker heard him creep-down the long corridor, and she came +clattering out with a candle, shaded behind her hand. “Something I've +forgotten,” he said. “Pardon, your Honour,” and then a deep courtesy. + +He opened noiselessly the little door leading from the council chamber +to the keep, but in the dark shadow of the steps the turnkey challenged +him. “Who's there? Stop!”--“Hush!”--“The Deemster! Beg your Honour's +pardon.”--“Show me the female wards.”--“This way your Honour.”--“Her +cell.” “Here, your Honour.”--“The key; your lantern. Now go back to the +guard-room.” He was with Kate. “My love, my love!”--“My darling!”-- +“Come, let us fly away from the island. I cannot face it. I thought I +could, but I cannot. I've got the child too. Come!” And then Kate--“I +would go anywhere with you, Philip, anywhere, anywhere. I only want your +love. But is this worthy of a man like you? Leave me. We have fallen too +low to drop into a pit like that. Away with you! Go!” And he slunk out +of the cell, before the wrathful love that would save him from himself. +He, the Deemster, the Governor, had slunk out like a dog. + +It was only a dream. When he awoke, the birds were singing and the day +was blue over the sea. The temptation was past; it was under his feet. +He could hesitate no longer; his cup was brimming over; he would drink +it to the dregs. + +Jem-y-Lord came with his mouth full of news. The town was decorated +with bunting. There was to be a general holiday. A grand stand had been +erected on the green in front of the Court-house. The people were not +going to be deterred by the Deemster's refusals. He who shrank from +honours was the more worthy of being honoured. They intended to present +their new Governor with an address. + +“Let them--let them,” said Philip. + +Jem looked up inquiringly. His master's face had a strange expression. + +“Shall I drive you to-day, your Excellency?” + +“Yes, my lad. It may be for the last time, Jemmy.” + +What was amiss with the Governor? Had the excitement proved too much for +him? + + + + +XXI. + +It was a perfect morning, soft and fresh, and sweet with the odours and +the colours of spring. New gorse flashed from the hedges, the violets +peeped from the banks; over the freshening green of the fields the young +lambs sported, and the lark sang in the thin blue air. + +The town, as they dipped into it, was full of life. At the turn of the +Court-house the crowd was densest. A policeman raised his hand in front +of the horses and Jem-y-Lord drew up. Then the High Bailiff stepped to +the gate and read an address. It mentioned Iron Christian, calling him +“The Great Deemster”; the town took pride to itself that the first Manx +Governor of Man was born in Ramsey. + +Philip answered briefly, confining himself to an expression of thanks; +there was great cheering and then the carriage moved on. The journey +thereafter was one long triumphal passage. At Sulby Street, and at +Ballaugh Street, there were flags and throngs of people. From time to +time other carriages joined them, falling into line behind. The Bishop +was waiting at Bishop's Court, and place was made for his carriage +immediately after the carriage of the Governor. + +At Tynwald there was a sweet and beautiful spectacle. The children of +St. John's were seated on the four rounds of the mount, boys and girls +in alternate rows, and from that spot, sacred to the memory of their +forefathers for a thousand years, they sang the National Anthem as +Philip passed on the road. + +The unhappy man lay back in his seat. His eyes filled, his throat rose. +“Oh, for what might have been!” + +Under Harry Delany's tree a company of fishermen were waiting with a +letter. It was from their mates at Kinsale. They could not be at home +that day, but their hearts were there. Every boat would fly her flag at +the masthead, and at twelve o'clock noon every Manx fisherman on Irish +waters would raise a cheer. If the Irishmen asked them what they meant +by that, they would answer and say, “It's for the fisherman's friend, +Governor Philip Christian.” + +The unhappy man was no longer in pain. His agony was beyond that. A sort +of divine madness had taken possession of him. He was putting the world +and the prince of the world behind his back. All this worldly glory +and human gratitude was but the temptation of Satan. With God's help he +would not succumb. He would resist. He would triumph over everything. + +Jem-y-Lord twisted on the box-seat. “See, your Excellency! Listen!” + +The flags of Castletown were visible on the Eagle Tower of the castle. +Then there was a multitudinous murmur. Finally a great shout. “Now, +boys! Three times three! Hip, hip, hurrah!” + +At the entrance to the town an evergreen arch had been erected. It bore +an inscription in Manx: “_Dooiney Vannin, lhiat myr hoilloo_”--“Man of +Man, success as thou deservest.” + +The carriage had slacked down to a walk. + +“Drive quicker,” cried Philip. + +“The streets are crowded, your Excellency,” said Jem-y-Lord. + +Flags were flying from every window, from every roof, from every +lamp-post. The people ran by the carriage cheering. Their shout was a +deafening uproar. + +Philip could not respond. “_She_ will hear it,” he thought. His head +dropped. He was picturing Kate in her cell with the clamour of his +welcome coming muffled through the walls. + +They took the road by the harbour. Suddenly the carriage stopped. The +men were taking the horses out of the shafts. “No, no,” cried Philip. + +He had an impulse to alight, but the carriage was moving again in a +moment. “It is the last of my punishment,” he thought, and again fell +back. Then the shouting and the laughter ran along the quay with the +crackle and roar of a fire. + +A regiment of soldiers lined the way from the drawbridge to the +porlcullis. As the carriage drew up, they presented arms in royal +salute. At the same moment the band of the regiment inside the Keep +played “God save the Queen.” + +The High Bailiff of the town opened the carriage-door and presented an +address. It welcomed the new Governor to the ancient castle wherein his +predecessors had been installed, and took fresh assurance of devotion +to the Crown from the circumstance that one of their own countrymen +had been thought worthy to represent it. No Manxman had ever been so +honoured in that island before since the days of the new Governor's +own great kinsman, familiarly and affectionately known to all Manxmen +through two centuries as Illiam Dhone (Brown William). + +Philip replied in few words, the cheering broke out afresh, the band +played again, and they entered the castle by the long corridor that led +to the council chamber. + +In an anteroom the officials were waiting. They were all elderly men and +old men, who had seen long and honourable service, but they showed no +jealousy. The Clerk of the Rolls received bis former pupil with a +shout wherein personal pride struggled with respect, and affection with +humility. Then the Attorney-General welcomed him in the name of the Bar, +as head of the Judicature, as well as head of the Legislature, taking +joy in the fact that one of their own profession had been elevated to +the highest office in the Isle of Man; glancing at his descent from +an historic Manx line, at his brief but distinguished career as judge, +which had revived the best traditions of judicial wisdom and eloquence, +and finally wishing him long life and strength for the fulfilment of the +noble promise of his young and spotless manhood. + +“Mr. Attorney-General,” said Philip, “I will not accept your +congratulations, much as it would rejoice my heart to do so. It would +only be another grief to me if you were to repent, as too soon you may, +the generous warmth of your reception.” + +There were puzzled looks, but the sage counsellors could not receive the +right impression; they could only understand the reply in the sense that +agreed with their present feelings. “It is beautiful,” they whispered, +“when a young man of real gifts is genuinely modest.” + +“Excuse me, gentlemen,” said Philip, “I must go into my room.” + +The Clerk of the Rolls followed him, saying-- + +“Ah! poor Tom Christian would have been a proud man this day--prouder +than if the honour had been his own--ten thousand thousand times.” + +“Have mercy, have mercy, and leave me alone,” said Philip. + +“I didn't mean to offend you, Christian,” said the Clerk. + +Philip put one hand affectionately on his shoulder. The eyes of the +robustious fellow began to blink, and he returned to his colleagues. + +There was a confused murmur beyond the farther wall of the room. It +was the room kept for the Deemster when he held court in the council +chamber. One of its two doors communicated with the bench. As usual, +a constable kept this door. The man loosened his chain and removed his +helmet. His head was grey. + +“Is the Court-house full?” asked Philip. + +The constable put his eye to the eye-hole. “Crowded, your Excellency. + +“Keep the passages clear.”--“Yes, your Excellency.” + +“Is the Clerk of the Court present?”--“He is, your Excellency.” + +“And the jailor?”--“Downstairs, your Excellency.” + +“Tell both they will be wanted.” + +The constable turned the key of the door and left the room. Jem-y-Lord +came puffing and perspiring. + +“The ex-Governor is coming over by the green, sir. He'll be here in a +moment.” + +“My wig and gown, Jemmy,” said Philip. + +“Deemster's wig, your Excellency?”--“Yes.” + +“Last time you'll wear it, sir.” + +“The last, indeed, my lad.” + +There was a clash of steel outside, followed by the beat of drum. + +“He's here,” said Jem-y-Lord. + +Philip listened. The rattling noise came to him through opening doors +and reverberating corridors like the trampling of a wave to a man +imprisoned in a cave. + +“She'll hear it, too.” That thought was with him constantly. In his +mind's eye he was seeing Kate, crouching in the fire-seat of the palace +room that was now her prison, and covering her ears to deaden the joyous +sounds that broke the usual silence of the gloomy walls. + +Jem-y-Lord was at the eye-hole of the door. “He's coming on to the +bench, sir. The gentlemen of the council are following him, and the +Court-house is full of ladies.” + +Philip was pacing to and fro like a man in violent agitation. At the +other side of the wall the confused murmur had risen to a sharp crackle +of many voices. + +The constable came back with the Clerk of the Court and the jailor. + +“Everything ready, your Excellency,” said the Clerk of the Court. + +The constable turned the key of the door, and laid his hand on the knob. + +“One moment--give me a moment,” said Philip. + +He was going through the last throes of his temptation. Something was +asking him, as if in tones of indignation, what right he had to bring +people there to make fools of them. And something was laughing as if in +mockery at the theatrical device he had chosen for gathering together +the people of rank and station, and then dismissing them like naughty +school-children. + +This idea clamoured loud in wild derision, telling him that he was +posing, that he was making a market of his misfortune, that he was +an actor, and that whatever the effect of the scene he was about to +perform, it was unnecessary and must be contemptible. “You talk of +your shame and humiliation--no atonement can wipe it out. You came here +prating to yourself of blotting out the past--no act of man can do so. +Vain, vain, and idle as well as vain! Mere mummery and display, and a +blow to the dignity of justice!” + +Under the weight of such torment the thought came to him that he should +go through the ceremony after all, that he should do as the people +expected, that he should accept the Governorship, and then defy the +social ostracism of the island by making Kate his wife. “It's not yet +too late,” said the tempter. + +Philip stopped in his walk and remembered the two letters of yesterday. +“Thank God! it _is_ too late,” he said. + +He had spoken the words aloud, and the officers in attendance glanced up +at him. Jem-y-Lord was behind, trembling and biting his lip. + +It was indeed too late for that temptation. And then the vanity of it, +the cruelty and insufficiency of it! He had been a servant of the world +long enough. From this day forth he meant to be its master. No matter +if all the devils of hell should laugh at him! He was going through with +his purpose. There was only one condition on which he could live in the +world--that he should renounce it. There was only one way of renouncing +the world--to return its wages and strip off its livery. His sin was +not only against Kate, against Pete; it was against the island, and the +island must set him free. + +Philip approached the door, slackened his pace with an air of +uncertainty; at one step from the constable he stopped. He was breathing +noisily. If the officers had observed him at that moment they must have +thought he looked like a man going to execution. But the constable gazed +before him with a sombre expression, held his helmet in one hand, and +the knob of the door in the other. + +“Now,” said Philip, with a long inspiration. + +There was a flash of faces, a waft of perfume, a flutter of +pocket-handkerchiefs, and a deafening reverberation. Philip was in the +Court-house. + + + + +XXII. + +It was remarked that his face was fearfully worn, and that it looked the +whiter for the white wig above it and the black gown beneath. His +large eyes flamed as with fire. “The sword too keen for the scabbard,” + whispered somebody. + +There is a kind of aloofness in strong men at great moments. Nobody +approaches them. They move onward of themselves, and stand or fall +alone. Everybody in court rose as Philip entered, but no one offered his +hand. Even the ex-Governor only bowed from the Governor's seat under the +canopy. + +Philip took his customary place as Deemster. He was then at the right +of the Governor, the Bishop being on the left. Behind the bishop sat the +Attorney-General, and behind Philip the Clerk of the Rolls. The cheers +that had greeted Philip on his entrance ended with the clapping of +hands, and died off like a wave falling back from the shingle. Then he +rose and turned to the Governor. + +“I do not know if you are aware, your Excellency, that this is +Deemster's Court-day?” + +The Governor smiled, and a titter went round the court. “We will +dispense with that,” he said. “We have better business this morning.” 34 + +“Excuse me, your Excellency,” said Philip; “I am still Deemster. With +your leave we will do everything according to rule.” + +There was a slight pause, a questioning look, then a cold answer. “Of +course, if you wish it; but your sense of duty----” + +The ladies in the galleries bad ceased to flutter their fans, and the +members of the House of Keys were shifting in their seats in the well +below. + +The Clerk of the Deemster's Court pushed through to the space beneath +the bench. “There is only one case, your Honour,” he whispered up. + +“Speak out, sir,” said Philip. “What case is it?” + +The Clerk gave an informal answer. It was the case of the young woman +who had attempted her life at Ramsey, and had been kept at Her Majesty's +pleasure. + +“How long has she been in prison?”--“Seven weeks, your Honour.” + +“Give me the book and I will sign the order for her release.” + +The book was handed to the bench. Philip signed it, handed it back to +the Clerk, and said with his face to the jailor-- + +“But keep her until somebody comes to fetch her.” + +There had been a cold silence during these proceedings. When they were +over, the ladies breathed freely. “You remember the case--left her +husband and little child--divorced since, I'm told--a worthless +person.”--“Ah! yes, wasn't she first tried the day the Deemster fell ill +in court?”--“Men are too tender with such creatures.” + +Philip had risen again. “Your Excellency, I have done the last of my +duties as Deemster.” His voice had hoarsened. He was a worn and stricken +figure. + +The ex Governor's warmth had been somewhat cooled by the unexpected +interruption. Nevertheless, the pock-marks smoothed out of his forehead, +and he rose with a smile. At the same moment the Clerk of the Rolls +stepped up and laid two books on the desk before him--a New Testament +in a tattered leather binding, and the _Liber Juramentorum_, the Book of +Oaths. + +“The regret I feel,” said the ex-Governor, “and feel increasingly, +day by day, at the severance of the ties which have bound me to this +beautiful island is tempered by the satisfaction I experience that the +choice of my successor has fallen upon one whom I know to be a gentleman +of powerful intellect and stainless honour. He will preserve that +autonomous independence which has come down to you from a remote +antiquity, at the same time that he will uphold the fidelity of a people +who have always been loyal to the Crown. I pray that the blessing of +Almighty God may attend his administration, and that, if the time ever +comes when he too shall stand in the position I occupy to-day, he may +have recollections as lively of the support and kindness he has met +with, and regrets as deep at his separation from the little Manx nation +which he leaves behind.” + +Then the Governor took the staff of office, and gave the signal for +rising. Everybody rose. “And now, sir,” he said, turning to Philip with +a smile, “to do everything, as you say, according to rule, let us first +take Her Majesty's commission of your appointment.” + +There was a moment's pause, and then Philip said in a cold clear voice-- + +“Your Excellency, I have no commission. The commission which I received +I have returned. I have, therefore, no right to be installed as +Governor. Also, I have resigned my office as Deemster, and, though my +resignation has not yet been accepted, I am, in reality, no longer in +the service of the State.” + +The people looked at the speaker with eyes that were full of the +stupefaction of surprise. Somebody bad risen at the back of the bench. +It was the Clerk of the Rolls. He stretched out his hand as if to touch +Philip on the shoulder. Then he hesitated and sat down again. + +“Gentlemen of the Council and of the Keys,” continued Philip, “you will +think you have assembled to see a man take a leap into an abyss +more dark than death. That is as it may be. You have a right to an +explanation, and I am here to make it. What I have done has been at the +compulsion of conscience. I am not worthy of the office I hold, still +less of the office that is offered me.” + +There was a half-articulate interruption from behind Philip's chair. + +“Ah! do not think, old friend, that I am dealing in vague self +depreciation. I should have preferred not to speak more exactly, but +what must be, must be. Your Excellency has spoken of my honour as +spotless. Would to God it were so; but it is deeply stained with sin.” + +He stopped, made an effort to begin afresh, and stopped again. Then, in +a low tone, with measured utterance, amid breathless silence, he said-- +“I have lived a double life. Beneath the life that you have seen there +has been another--God only knows how full of wrongdoing and disgrace and +shame. It is no part of my duty to involve others in this confession. +Let it be enough that my career has been built on falsehood and robbery, +that I have deceived the woman who loved me with her heart of hearts, +and robbed the man who would have trusted me with his soul.” + +The people began to breathe audibly. There was the scraping of a chair +behind the speaker. The Clerk of the Rolls had risen. His florid face +was violently agitated. + +“May it please your Excellency,” he began, faltering and stammering, in +a husky voice, “it will be within your Excellency's knowledge, and the +knowledge of every one on the island, that his Honour has only just +risen from a long and serious illness, brought on by overwork, by too +zealous attention to his duties, and that--in fact, that--well, not to +blink the plain truth, that----” + +A sigh of immense relief had passed over the court, and the Governor, +grown very pale, was nodding in assent. But Philip only smiled sadly and +shook his head. + +“I have been ill indeed,” he said, “but not from the cause you speak of. +The just judgment of God has overtaken me.” + +The Clerk of the Rolls sank back into his seat. + +“The moment came when I had to sit in judgment on my own sin, the moment +when she who had lost her honour in trusting to mine stood in the dock +before me. I, who had been the first cause of her misfortunes, sat on +the bench as her judge. She is now in prison and I am here. The same law +which has punished her failing with infamy has advanced me to power.” + +There was an icy quiet in the court, such as comes with the first gleam +of the dawn. By that quick instinct which takes possession of a crowd +at great moments, the people understood everything--the impurity of +the character that had seemed so pure, the nullity of the life that had +seemed so noble. + +“When I asked myself what there was left to me to do, I could see but +one thing. It was impossible to go on administering justice, being +myself unjust, and remembering that higher bar before which I too +was yet to stand. I must cease to be Deemster. But that was only my +protection against the future, not my punishment for the past. I could +not surrender myself to any earthly court, because I was guilty of no +crime against earthly law. The law cannot take a man into the court of +the conscience. He must take himself there.” + +He stopped again, and then said quietly, “My sentence is this open +confession of my sin, and renunciation of the worldly advantages which +have been bought by the suffering of others.” + +It was no longer possible to doubt him. He had sinned, and he had reaped +the reward of his sin. Those rewards were great and splendid, but he had +come to renounce them all. The dreams of ambition were fulfilled, the +miracle of life was realised, the world was conquered and at his feet, +yet he was there to give up all. The quiet of the court had warmed to a +hush of awe. He turned to the bench, but every face was down. Then his +own eyes fell. + +“Gentlemen of the Council, you who have served the island so long and so +honourably, perhaps you blame me for permitting you to come together +for the hearing of this confession. But if you knew the temptation I +was under to fly away without making it, to turn my back on my past, +to shuffle, my fault on to Fate, to lay the blame on Life, to persuade +myself that I could not have acted differently, you would believe it was +not lightly, and God knows, not vainly, that I suffered you to come here +to see me mount my scaffold.” + +He turned back to the body of the court. + +“My countrymen and countrywomen, you who have been so much more kind to +me than my character justified or my conduct merited. I say good-bye; +but not as one who is going away. In conquering the impulse to go +without confessing, I conquered the desire to go at all. Here, where my +old life has fallen to ruin, my new life must be built up. That is the +only security. It is also the only justice. On this island, where my +fall is known, my uprising may come--as is most right--only with bitter +struggle and sorrow and tears. But when it comes, it will come securely. +It may be in years, in many years, but I am willing to wait--I am ready +to labour. And, meantime, she who was worthy of my highest honour will +share my lowest degradation. That is the way of all women--God love and +keep them!” + +The exaltation of his tones infected everybody. + +“It may be that you think I am to be pitied. There have been hours of my +life when I have been deserving of pity. But they have been the hours, +the dark hours, when, in the prodigality of your gratitude, you have +loaded me with distinctions, and a shadow has haunted me, saying, +'Philip Christian, they think you a just judge--you are not a just +judge; they think you an upright man--you are not an upright man.' Do +not pity me now, when the dark hours are passed, when the new life has +begun, when I am listening at length to the voice of my heart, which has +all along been the voice of God.” + +His eyes shone, his mouth was smiling. + +“If you think how narrowly I escaped the danger of letting things go +on as they were going, of covering up my fault, of concealing my true +character, of living as a sham and dying as a hypocrite, you will +consider me worthy of envy instead. Good-bye! good-bye! God bless you!” + +Before any one appeared to be aware that his voice had ceased he was +gone from the bench, and the Deemster's chair stood empty. Then the +people turned and looked into each other's stricken faces. They were +still standing, for nobody had thought of sitting down. + +There was no further speaking that day. Without a word or a sign the +Governor descended from his seat and the proceedings came to an end. +Every one moved towards the door. “A great price to pay for it, though,” + thought the men. “How he must have loved her, after all,” thought the +women. + +At that moment the big Queen Elizabeth clock of the Castle was striking +twelve, and the fishermen on Irish waters were raising a cheer for their +friend at home. A loud detonation rang out over the town. It was the +report of a gun. There was another, and then a third. The shots were +from a steamer that was passing the bay. + +Philip remembered--it was Pete's last farewell. + + + + +XXIII. + +Half an hour later the Keep, the courtyard, and the passage to the +portcullis were filled with an immense crowd. Ladies thronged the two +flights of external steps to the prisoners' chapel and the council +chamber. Men had climbed as high as to the battlements, and were looking +down over the beetle-browed walls. All eyes were on the door to the +debtors' side of the prison, and a path from it was being kept clear. +The door opened and Philip and Kate came out. There was no other exit, +and they must have taken it. He was holding her firmly by the hand, and +half-leading, half-drawing her along. Under the weight of so many eyes, +her head was held down, but those who were near enough to see her face +knew that her shame was swallowed up in happiness and her fear in love. +Philip was like a man transfigured. The extreme pallor of his cheeks +was gone, his step was firm, and his face was radiant. It was the common +remark that never before had he looked so strong, so buoyant, so noble. +This was the hour of his triumph, not that within the walls; this, when +his sin was confessed, when conscience had no power to appal him, when +the world and the pride of the world were beneath his feet, and he was +going forth from a prison cell, hand in hand with the fallen woman by +his side, to face the future with their bankrupt lives. + +And she? She was sharing his fiery ordeal. Before her outraged +sisters and all the world she was walking with him in the depth of his +humiliation, at the height of his conquest, at the climax of his shame +and glory. + +Once for a moment she halted and stumbled as if under the hot breath +that was beating upon her head. But he put his arm about her, and in a +moment she was strong. The sun dipped down from the great tower on to +his upturned face, and his eyes were glistening through their tears. + +THE END. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Manxman, by Hall Caine + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MANXMAN *** + +***** This file should be named 25570-0.txt or 25570-0.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/5/5/7/25570/ + +Produced by David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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