When the tumult was over, and all lives appeared to be saved, and nothing seemed lost save the two vessels—the schooner and the yawl, which still rose and fell on the Carick and the forked reef of the head—and the people separated, and the three old net weavers straggled back to their home, the crew of the Peveril went off with the Fairbrothers to Lague. Great preparations were already afoot there, for Asher had sent on a message ahead of them, and the maids were bustling about, the fire was rekindled in the kitchen, and the kettle was singing merrily. And first there was a mouthful of grog, steaming hot, for every drenched and dripping seaman, with a taste of toast to sweeten it. Then there was getting all the men into a change of dry clothes in order that they might wait for a bite of supper, and until beds were shuffled about and shakedowns fetched out. And high was the sport and great the laughter at the queer shifts the house was put to that it might find clean rigging for so many, on even so short a cruise. When the six Fairbrothers had lent all the change they had of breeches and shirts, the maids had to fish out from their trunks a few petticoats and some gowns, for the sailors still unfurnished. But the full kit was furnished out at length, and when the ship's company mustered down in the kitchen from the rooms above, all in their motley colors and queer mixture of garments, with their grizzled faces wiped dry, but their hair still wet and lank and glistening, no one could have guessed, from the loud laughter wherewiththey looked each other over, that only an hour before Death itself had so nearly tricked them. Like noisy children let out of school they all were, now that they were snugly housed; for a seagoing man, however he may be kicked about on the sea, is not used to bedownheartedon the land. And if two or three of the company continued to complain of their misfortunes, their growlings but lent zest to the merriment of the rest. So that they laughed loud when old Davy, cutting a most ridiculous figure in a linsey-wolsey petticoat and a linen bodice that would not meet over his hairy chest, began to grumble that he had followed the sea forty years and never been wrecked before, as if that were the best of all reasons why he should not come by such rough harm now, and a base advantage taken of him by Providence in his old age.
And louder still they laughed at the skipper himself when still sorely troubled by his evil luck, he wanted to know what all their thanking God was for, since his good ship lay a rotten hulk on a cruel reef; and if it was so very good of Providence to let them off that rock, it would have been better far not to let them on to it. And loudest of all they laughed, and laughed again, when an Irish sailor told them, with all his wealth of brogue, of a prayer that he had overheard old Davy pray while they hung helpless on the rock, thinking never to escape from it. "Oh, Lord, only save my life this once, and I'll smuggle no more," the Manxman had cried; "and it's not for myself but ould Betty I ax it, for Thou knowest she's ten years dead in Maughold churchyard with twenty rolls of good Scotch cloth in the grave atop of her. But I had nowhere else to put it, and, good Lord, only remember the last day, and save my life till I dig it up from off of her chest, for she was never a powerful woman."
And the danger being over, neither Davy nor the skipper took it ill that the men should make sport of their groanings, for they laughed with the rest, and together they waked a most reckless uproar.
All this while, though Mrs. Fairbrother had not left her bedroom, the girls' feet had been jigging about merrily over the white holy-stoned floor to get some supper spread, and Greeba, having tapped Jason, on the shoulder, had carried him off quietly to the door of the parlor, and pushed him in there while she ran to get a light, for the room was dark. It was also cool, with crocks of milk standing for cream,and basins of eggs and baskets of new-made cheese. And when she returned with the candle in one hand, shaded by the luminous fingers of the other, and its bright light on her comely face, she would have loaded him with every good thing the house contained—collared head, and beef, and binjeen and Manx jough, and the back of the day's pudding. Nothing he would have, however, save one thing, and that made great sport between them: for it was an egg, and he ate it raw, shell included, crunching it like an apple. At that sight she made pretence to shudder. And then she laughed like a bell, saying he was a wild man indeed, and she had thought so when she first set eyes on him on the shore, and already she was more than half afraid of him.
Then they laughed again, she very slyly, he very bashfully, and while her bright eyes shone upon him she told him how like he was, now that she saw him in the light, to some one else she knew of. He asked her who that was, and she answered warily, with something between a smile and a blush, that it was one who had left the island that very night.
By this time the clatter of dishes mingled with the laughter and merry voices that came from the other side of the hall, and the two went back to the kitchen.
Asher Fairbrother, who had been dozing like a sheep dog in the ingle, was then rising to his feet, and saying, "And now for supper; and let it be country fashion, girls, at this early hour of the morning."
Country fashion indeed it was, with the long oak table scrubbed white like a butcher's board, and three pyramids of potatoes, boiled in their jackets, tossed out at its head and foot and middle, three huge blocks of salt, each with its wooden spoon, laid down at the same spaces, and a plate with a boiled herring and a basin of last night's milk before every guest. And the seamen shambled into their places, any man anywhere, all growling or laughing, or both; and the maids flipped about very lightly, rueing nothing, amid so many fresh men's faces, of the strange chance that had fetched them out of their beds for work at double tides.
And seeing the two coming back together from the parlor, the banter of the seamen took another turn, leaving old Davy for young Jason, who was reminded of the kiss he had earned on the beach, and asked if ever before a sailor lad had got the like from a lady without look or longing. Such was the flow of their banter until Greeba, beingabashed, and too hard set to control the rich color that mounted to her cheeks, fled laughing from the room to hide her confusion.
But no rudeness was intended by the rude sea dogs, and no offence was taken; for in that first hour, after they had all been face to face with death, the barrier of manners stood for nothing to master or man or mistress or maid.
But when the rough jest seemed to have gone far enough, and Jason, who had laughed at first, had begun to hang his head—sitting just where Stephen Orry had sat when, long years before, he took refuge in that house from the four blue-jackets in pursuit of him—Old Davy Kerruish got up and pulled his grizzled forelock, and shouted to him above the tumult of the rest:
"Never mind the loblolly-boys, lad," he cried, "it's just jealous they are, being so long out of practice; and there's one thing you can say, anyway, and that's this—the first thing you did on setting foot in the Isle of Man was to save the life of a Manxman."
"Then here's to his right good health," cried Asher Fairbrother, with his mouth in a basin of milk; and in that brave liquor, with three times three and the thud and thung of twentyhardfists on the table, the rough toast was called round.
And in the midst of it, when Greeba, having conquered her maiden shame, had crept back to the kitchen, and Mrs. Fairbrother, aroused at length by the lightsome hubbub, had come down to put an end to it, the door of the porch opened, and crazy old Chalse A'Killey stood upon the threshold, very pale, panting for breath, and with a ghastly light in his sunken eyes, and cried, "He's dying. Where's the young man that fetched him ashore? He's crying out for him, and I'm to fetch him along with me straight away."
Jason rose instantly. "I'll go," he said, and he snatched up a cap.
"And I'll go with you," said Greeba, and she caught up a shawl.
Not a word more was said, and at the next instant, before the others had recovered from their surprise, or the laughter and shouting were yet quite gone from their lips, the door had closed again and the three were gone.
Chalse, in his eagerness to be back, strode on some paces ahead in the darkness, and Jason and Greeba walked together.
"Who is it?" said Jason. "Do you know?"
"No," said Greeba. "Chalse!" she cried, but the old man, with his face down, trudged along as one who heard nothing. She tripped up to him, and Jason walking behind heard the sound of muttered words between them, but caught nothing of what passed. Dropping back to Jason's side, the girl said: "It's a man whom nobody holds of much account, poor soul."
"What is he?" said Jason.
"A smuggler, people say, or perhaps worse. His wife has been long years dead, and he has lived alone ever since, shunned by most folks, and by his own son among others. It was his son who sailed to Iceland to-night."
"Iceland? Did you say Iceland?"
"Yes, Iceland. It is your own country, is it not? But he hadn't lived with his father since he was a child. He was brought up by my own dear father. It was he who seemed to be so like to you."
Jason stopped suddenly in the dark lane.
"What's the name?" he asked, hoarsely.
"The son's name? Michael."
"Michael what?"
"Michael Sunlocks."
Jason drew a long breath, and strode on without a word more. Very soon they wereoutsidethe little house in Port-y-Vullin.
Chalse was there before them, and he stood with the door ajar.
"Whist!" the old man whispered. "He's ebbing fast. He's going out with the tide. Listen!"
They crept in on tiptoe, but there was small need for quiet. The place was a scene of direful uproar and most gruesome spectacle. It was all but as thronged of people as it had been nineteen years before, on the day of Liza Killey's wedding. On the table, the form, the three-legged stool, and in the chimney corner, they sat together cheek-by-jowl, with eyes full of awe, most of them silent or speaking low behind their hands. On the bed the injured man lay and tossed in a strongdelirium. The wet clothes wherein he had passed through the sea had been torn off, his body wrapped in a gray blanket, and the wound on his head bandaged with a cloth. His lips were discolored, his cheeks were white, and his hair was damp with the sweat that ran in big drops to his face and neck. At his feet NaryCrowe stood, holding a horn cup of brandy, and by his head knelt Kane Wade, the Methodist, praying in a loud voice.
"God bring him to Thy repentance," cried Kane Wade; "restore him to the joy of Thy salvation. The pains of hell have gotten hold of him. Hark how the devil is tearing him. He is like to the man with the unclean spirit, who had his dwelling among the tombs. The devil is gotten into him. But out wi' thee, Satan, and no more two words about it! Thanks be unto God, we can wrestle with thee in prayer. Gloom at us, Satan, but never will we rise from our knees until God hath given us the victory over thee, lest our brother fall into the jaws of hell, and our own souls be not free from blood-guiltiness."
In this strain he prayed, shouting at the full pitch of the vast bellows of his lungs, and loudest of all when the delirium of the sick man was strongest, until his voice failed him from sheer exhaustion, and then his lips still moved, and he mumbled hoarsely beneath his breath.
Jason stood in the middle of the floor and looked on in his great stature over the heads of the people about him, while Greeba, with quiet grace and gentle manners, thinned the little hut of some of the many with whom the dense air smoked and reeked. After that she lifted the poor restless, tumbling, wet head from its hard pillow, and put it to rest on her own soft arm, with her cool palm to the throbbing brow, and then she damped the lips with the brandy from NaryCrowe'scup. This she did, and more than this, seeming to cast away from her in a moment all her lightness, her playfulness, her bounding happy spirits, and in the hour of need to find such tender offices come to her, as to all true women, like another sense.
And presently the delirium abated, the weary head lay still, the bleared eyes opened, the discolored lips parted, and the dying man tried to speak. But before ever a word could come, the change was seen by Kane Wade, who cried, "Thank God, he has found peace. Thank the Lord, who has given us the victory. Satan is driven out of him. Mercy there is for the vilest of sinners." And on the top of that wild shout old Chalse struck up, without warning, and in the craziest screech that ever came from human throat, a rugged hymn of triumph, wherein all the lines were one line and all the notes one note, but telling how the Lord was King over death and hell and all the devils.
Again and again he sang a verse of it, going faster at every repetition, and the othersjoinedhim, struggling to keep pace with him: and all but Greeba, who tried by vain motions to stop the tumult, and Jason, who looked down at the strange scene with eyes full of wonder. At last the mad chorus of praise came to an end, and the sick man said, casting his weak eyes into the faces about him, "Has he come?"
"He is here," whispered Greeba, and she motioned to Jason.
The lad pushed through to the bedside, and then for the first time he came face to face with Stephen Orry.
Did any voice, unheard of the others, cry in his ear at that moment, "Jason, Jason, this is he whom you have crossed the seas to slay, and he has sent for you to bless you, for the last sands of his life are running out?"
"Leave us alone together," said Stephen Orry; and Greeba, after beating out his pillow and settling his head on it, was about to move away, when he whispered, "Not you," and held her back.
Then with one accord the others called on to him not to tarry over carnal thoughts, for his soul was passing through dark waters, and he should never take rest until he had cast anchor after a troublous voyage.
"Get religion," cried Kane Wade. "Lay hoult of a free salvation," cried old Chalse. "All flesh is as grass," cried Matt Mylechreest. "Pray without ceasing," they all cried together, with much besides in the same wild strain.
"I cannot pray," the sick man muttered.
"Then we'll pray for you, mate," shouted Kane Wade.
"Ah, pray, pray, pray," mumbled Stephen Orry, "but it's no good; it's too late, too late."
"Now is the 'pointed time," shouted Kane Wade. "The Lord can save to the uttermost the worst sinner of us all."
"If I'm a sinner, let me not be a coward in my sins," said Stephen Orry. "Have pity on me and leave me."
But Kane Wade went on to tell the story of his own conversion:—It was on a Saturday night of the mackerel season down at Kinsale. The conviction had been borne in upon him that if he did not hear the pardoning voice before the clock struck twelve, he would be damned to all eternity. When the clock began to warn for midnight the hair of his flesh stood up, for he was still unsaved. But before it had finished striking the Saviour was his, and he was rejoicing in a blessed salvation.
"How can you torture a poor dying man?" muttered Stephen Orry.
"Call on the Lord, mate," shouted Kane Wade, "'Lord, I belave, help Thou my unbelafe.'"
"I've something to do, and the pains of death have hold of me," muttered Stephen Orry.
"He parthoned the thafe on the cross," cried old Chalse, "and he's gotten parthon left for you."
"Cruel, cruel! Have you no pity for a wretched dying man?" mumbled Stephen Orry.
"Ye've not lived a right life, brother," cried Kane Wade, "and ye've been ever wake in yer intellects, so never take rest till ye've read your title clear."
"You would scarce think they could have the heart, these people—you would scarce think it, would you?" said Stephen Orry, lifting his poor glassy eyes to Greeba's face.
Then with the same quiet grace as before, the girl got up, and gently pushed the men out of the house one by one. "Come back in an hour," she whispered.
It was a gruesome spectacle—the rude Methodists, with their loud voices and hot faces and eyes of flame, trying to do their duty by the soul of their fellow creature; the poor tortured sinner, who knew he had lived an evil life and saw no hope of pardon, and would not be so much a coward as to cry for mercy in his last hours; the young Icelander looking on in silence and surprise: and the girl moving hither and thither among them all, like a soft-voiced dove in a cage of hoarse jackdaws.
But when the little house was clear, and the Methodists, who started a hymn on the beach outside, had gone at last, and their singing had faded away, and there was only the low wail of the ebbing tide where there had been so loud a Babel of many tongues, Stephen Orry raised himself feebly on his elbow and asked for his coat. Jason found it on the hearth and lifted it up, still damp and stiff, from the puddle of water that lay under it. Then Stephen Orry told him to put his hand in the breast pocket and take out what he would find there. Jason did as he was bidden and drew forth the bag of money. "Here it is," he said; "what shall I do with it?"
"It is yours," said Stephen Orry.
"Mine?" said Jason.
"I meant it for my son," said Stephen Orry. He spokein his broken English, but let us take the words out of his mouth. "It's yours now, my lad. Fourteen years I've been gathering it, meaning it for my son. Little I thought to part with it to a stranger, but it's yours, for you've earned it."
"No, no," said Jason. "I've earned nothing."
"You tried to save my life," said Stephen Orry.
"I couldn't help doing that," said Jason, "and I want no pay."
"But it's two hundred pounds, my lad."
"No matter."
"Then how much have you got?"
"Nothing."
"Has the wreck taken all?"
"Yes—no—that is, I never had anything."
"Take the money; for God's sake take it, and do what you like with it, or I'll die in torture," cried Stephen Orry, and with a groan he threw himself backward on the bed.
"I'll keep it for your son," said Jason. "His name is Michael Sunlocks, isn't it? And he has sailed for Iceland, hasn't he? That's my country, and I may meet him some day."
Then in a broken voice Stephen Orry said, "If you have a father he must be proud of you, my lad. Who is he?"
And Jason answered moodily, "I have no father—none I ever knew."
"Did he die in your childhood?"
"No."
"Before you were born?"
"No."
"Is he alive?"
"Ay, for aught I know."
Stephen Orry struggled to his elbow again. "Then he had wronged your mother?" he said with his breath coming quick.
"Ay, maybe so."
"The villain! Yet who am I to rail at him? Is your mother still alive?"
"No."
"Where is your father?"
"Don't speak of him," said Jason in an under-breath.
"But what's your name, my lad?"
"Jason."
With a long sigh of relief Stephen Orry dropped back andmuttered to himself, "To think that such a father should never have known he had such a son."
The power of life ebbed fast in him, but after a pause he said,
"My lad."
"Well?" said Jason.
"I've done you a great wrong."
"When did you do me a wrong?"
"To-night."
"How?"
"No matter. There's no undoing it now; God forgive me. But let me be your father, though I'm a dying man, for that will give you the right to keep my poor savings for yourself."
"But they belong to your son," said Jason.
"He'll never touch them," said Stephen Orry.
"Why not?" said Jason.
"Don't ask me. Leave me alone. For mercy's sake don't torture a dying man," cried Stephen Orry.
"That's not what I meant to do," said Jason, giving way; "and, if you wish it, I will keep the money."
"Thank God," said Stephen Orry.
Some moments thereafter he lay quiet, breathing fast and loud, while Greeba hovered about him. Then in a feebler voice he said, "Do you think, my lad, you'll ever meet my son?"
"Maybe so," said Jason. "I'll go back when I've done what I came to do."
"What is that?" Greeba whispered, but he went on without answering her.
"Though our country is big, our people are few. Where will he be?"
"I scarce can say. He has gone to look for someone. He's a noble boy, I can tell you that. And it's something for a father to think of when his time comes, isn't it? He loves his father, too—that is, he did love me when he was a little chap. You must know he had no mother. Only think, I did everything for him, though I was a rough fellow. Yes, I nursed him and comforted him as any woman might. Ay, and the little man loved me then, for all he doesn't bear his father's name now."
Jason glanced up inquiringly, first at Stephen Orry and then at Greeba. Stephen saw nothing. His eyes were dim, but full of tenderness, and his deep voice was verygentle, and he rambled on with many a break and between many a groan, for the power of life was low in him.
"You see I called him Sunlocks. That was because it was kind and close-like. He used to ride on my shoulder. We played together then, having no one else, and I was everything to him and he was all the world to me. Ah, that was long ago, Sunlocks! Little Sunlocks! My little Sunlocks! My own little——"
At that point he laughed a little, and then seemed to weep like a child, though no tears came to his eyes, and the next moment, under the pain of joyful memories and the flow of blood upon the brain, his mind began to wander. It was very pitiful to look upon. His eyes were open, but it was clear that they did not see; his utterance grew thick and his words were confused and foolish; but his face was lit up with a surprising joy, and you knew that the years had rolled back, and the great rude fellow was alone with his boy, and doating on him. Sometimes he would seem to listen as if for the child's answer, and then he would laugh as if at its artless prattle. Again he would seem to sing the little one to sleep, crooning very low a broken stave that ran a bar and then stopped. Again he would say very slowly what sounded like the words of some baby prayer, and while he did so his chin would be twisted into his breast and his arms would struggle to cross it, as though the child itself were once more back in his bosom.
At all this Greeba cried behind her hands, unable to look or listen any longer, and Jason, though he shed no tears, said, in a husky voice, "He cannot be altogether bad who loved his son so."
The delirium grew stronger, the look of joy and the tender words gave place to glances of fear and some quick beseeching, and then Jason said in a tremulous whisper, "It must be something to know you have a father who loves you like that."
But hardly had the words been spoken when he threw back his head and asked in a firm voice how far it was to Port Erin.
"About thirty miles," said Greeba, looking up at the sudden question.
"Not more?" asked Jason.
"No.Hehas lived there," she answered, with a motion of her head downwards towards the bed.
"He?"
"Yes, ever since his wife died. Before that they lived in this place with Michael Sunlocks. His wife met with a terrible death."
"How?"
"She was murdered by some enemy of her husband. The man escaped, but left his name behind him. It was Patricksen."
"Patricksen?"
"Yes. That must be fourteen years ago, and since then he has lived alone at Port Erin. Do you wish to go there?"
"Ay—that is, so I intended."
"Why?"
"To look for someone."
"Who is it?"
"My father."
For a moment Greeba was silent, and then she said with her eyes down:
"Why look forhimif he wronged your mother?"
"That's why I meant to do so."
She looked up into his face, and stammered, "But why?"
He did not appear to hear her: his eyes were fixed on the man on the bed; and hardly had she asked the question when she covered her ears with her hands as though to shut out his answer.
"Wasthatwhy you came?" she asked.
"Yes," he answered. "If we had not been wrecked to-night I should have dropped overboard and deserted."
"Strange," she said. "It was just whathedid, when he came to the island nineteen years ago."
"Yes, nineteen years ago," Jason repeated.
He spoke like a man in a sleep, and she began to tremble.
"What is the matter?" she said.
Within a few minutes his face had suddenly changed, and it was now awful to look upon. Not for an instant did he turn his eyes from the bed.
The delirium of the sick man had deepened by this time; the little, foolish, baby play-words in the poor broken English came from him no more, but he seemed to ask eager questions, in a tongue that Greeba did not understand.
"This man is an Icelander," said Jason.
"Didn't you know that before?" said Greeba.
"What is his name?" said Jason.
"Haven't you heard it yet?"
"What is his name?"
Then for one quick instant he turned his face towards her face, and she seemed to read his thought.
"Oh God!" she cried, and she staggered back.
Just then there was a sound of footsteps on the shingle outside, and at the next moment Stean and Thurstan Fairbrother and old Davy Kerruish pushed open the door. They had come to fetch Greeba.
"The Methodee man tould us," said Davy, standing by Jason's side, "and, my gough, but it's mortal cur'ous. What's it saying, 'Talk of the divil, and sure enough it was the big widda man hisself we were talking of, less nor a half hour afore we struck."
"Come, my lass," said Thurstan.
"No, no, I'll stay here," said Greeba.
"But your mother is fidgeting, and this is no place for a slip of a girl—come!"
"I'll stay with him alone," said Jason.
"No, no," cried Greeba.
"It's the lad's right, for all," said old Davy. "He fetched the poor chap out of the water. Come, let's take the road for it."
"Will no one stay instead of me?" said Greeba.
"Where's the use?" said Davy. "He's raelly past help. He's outward bound, poor chap. Poor Orry! Poor ould Stephen!"
Then they drew Greeba away, and with a look of fear fixed on Jason's face she passed out at the door.
Jason was now alone with Stephen Orry, and felt like a man who had stumbled into a hidden grave. He had set out over the seas to search for his father, and here, at his first setting foot on the land, his father lay at his feet. So this was Stephen Orry; this was he for whom his mother had given up all; this was he for whom she had taken a father's curse; this was he for whom she had endured poverty and shame; this was he who had neglected her, struck her, forgotten her with another woman; this was he who had killed her—the poor, loving, loyal, passionate heart—not in a day, or an hour, or a moment, but in twenty long years. Jason stood over the bed and looked down. Surely the Lord God had heard his great vow and delivered the man into his hands. He would have hunted the world over to find him, but here at a stride he had him. It was Heaven's own justice, and if he held back now the curse of his dead mother would follow him from the grave.
Yet a trembling shook his whole frame, and his heart beat as if it would break. Why did he wait? He remembered the tenderness that had crept upon him not many minutes ago, as he listened to the poor baby babble of the man's delirium, and at that the gall in his throat seemed to choke him. He hated himself for yielding to it, for now he knew for whom it had been meant. It had been meant for his own father doating over the memory of another son. That son had supplanted himself; that son's mother had supplanted his own mother; and yet he, in his ignorance, had all but wept for both of them. But no matter, he was now to be God's own right hand of justice on this evil-doer.
Dawn was breaking, and its woolly light crept lazily in at the little window, past the lamp that still burned on the window board. The wind had fallen, and the sea lay gloomy and dark, as if with its own heavy memories of last night's work. The gray light fell on the sick man's face, and under Jason's eyes it seemed to light up the poor, miserable, naked soul within. The delirium had now set in strong, and many were the wild words and frequent was the cry that rang through the little house.
"Not while he is like that," thought Jason. "I will wait for the lull."
He took up a pillow in both hands and stood by the bed and waited, never lifting his eyes off the face. But the lull did not come. Would it not come at all? What if the delirium were never to pass away? Could he still do the thing he intended? No, no, no! But Heaven had heard his vow and led him there. The delirium would yet pass; then he would accuse his father, face to face and eye to eye, and then—
The current of Jason's thoughts was suddenly arrested by a cry from the sick man. It was "Rachel! Rachel! Rachel!" spoken in a voice of deep entreaty, and there came after it in disjointed words of the Icelandic tongue a pitiful appeal for forgiveness. At that a great fear seized upon Jason, and the pillow dropped from his hands to the ground. "Rachel! Rachel!" It was the old cry of the years that were gone, but working with how great a difference—then, to stir up evil passions—now, to break down the spirit of revenge.
"Rachel! Rachel!" came again in the same pitiful voice of supplication; and at the sound of that name so spoken, the bitterness of Jason's heart went off like a wail of thewind. It was a cry of remorse; a cry for pardon; a cry for mercy. There could be no jugglery. In that hour of the mind's awful vanquishment a human soul stood naked behind him as before its Maker.
Jason's great resolve was shaken. Had it been only a blind tangle of passion and pain? If the Almighty had called him to be the instrument of His vengeance, would He have delivered his enemy into his hands like this—dying, delirious, with broken brain and broken heart?
Still his mother's name came from his father's lips, and then his mind went back to the words that had so lately passed between them. "Let me be your father, though I am a dying man." Ah! sweet, beautiful, blind fallacy—could he not let it be?
The end was very near; the delirium passed away, and Stephen Orry opened his eyes. The great creature was as quiet as a child now, and as soft and gentle as a child's was his deep hoarse voice. He knew that he had been wandering in his mind, and when he looked into Jason's face a pale smile crossed his own.
"I thought I had found her," he said, very simply, "my poor young wife that once was; it was she that I lost so long ago, and did such wrong by."
Jason's throat was choking him, but he stammered out, "Lie still, sir, lie still and rest."
But Stephen Orry talked on in the same simple way: "Ah, how silly I am! I forgot you didn't know."
"Lie still and rest," said Jason again.
"There was someone with her, too. I thought I was her son—her child and mine, that was to come when I left her. And, only think, I looked again, and it seemed to be you. Yes, you—for it was the face of him that fetched me out of the sea. I thought you were my son indeed."
Then Jason could bear up no longer. He flung himself down on his knees by the bedside, and buried his face in the dying man's breast.
"Father," he sobbed, "Iamyour son."
But Stephen Orry only smiled, and answered very quietly, "Ah, yes, I remember—that was part of our bargain, my good lad. Well, God bless you, my son. God bless and speed you."
And that was the end of Orry.
Now the facts of this history must stride on some four years, and come to a great crisis in the lives of Greeba and Jason. Every event of that time seemed to draw these two together, and the first of the circumstances that bound them came very close on the death of Stephen Orry. Only a few minutes after Greeba, at the bidding of her two brothers, Stean and Thurstan, had left Jason alone with the dying man, she had parted from them without word or warning, and fled back to the little hut in Port-y-Vullin. With a wild laboring of heart, panting for breath and full of dread, she had burst the door open, fearing to see what she dare not think of; but, instead of the evil work she looked for, she had found Jason on his knees by the bedside, sobbing as if his heart would break, and Stephen Orry passing away with a tender light in his eyes and a word of blessing on his lips. At that sight she had stood on the threshold like one who is transfixed, and how long that moment had lasted she never knew. But the thing she remembered next was that Jason had taken her by the hand and drawn her up, with all the fire of her spirit gone, to where the man lay dead before them, and had made her swear to him there and then never to speak of what she had seen, and to put away from her mind forever the vague things she had but partly guessed. After that he had told her, with a world of pain, that Stephen Orry had been his father; that his father had killed his mother by base neglect and cruelty; that to wipe out his mother's wrongs he had vowed to slay his father; and that his father, not knowing him, save in the vision of his delirium, had died in the act of blessing him. Greeba had yielded to Jason, because she had been conquered by his stronger will, and was in fear of the passion whichflashed in his face; but hearing all this, she remembered Michael Sunlocks, and how he must stand as the son of the other woman; and straightway she found her own reasons why she should be silent on all that she had that night seen and heard. This secret was the first of the bonds between them; and the second, though less obvious, was even more real.
Losing no time, Adam Fairbrother had written a letter to Michael Sunlocks, by that name, telling him of the death of his father, and how, so far as the facts were known, the poor man came by it in making the port in his boat after seeing his son away in the packet. This he had despatched to the only care known to him, that of the Lord Bishop Petersen, at his Latin School of Reykjavik; but after a time the letter had come back, with a note from the Bishop saying that no such name was known to him, and no such student was under his charge. Much afraid that the same storm that had led Stephen Orry to his end had overtaken Michael Sunlocks also, Adam Fairbrother had then promptly re-addressed his letter to the care of the Governor-General, who was also the Postmaster, and added a postscript asking if, after the sad event whereof he had thought it his task in love and duty to apprise him, there was the same necessity that his dear boy should remain in Iceland. "But, indite me a few lines without delay," he wrote, "giving me assurance of your safe arrival, for what has happened of late days has haunted me with many fears of mishap."
Then in due course an answer had come from Michael Sunlocks, saying he had landed safely, but there being no regular mails, he had been compelled to await the sailing of English ships to carry his letters; that by some error he had missed the first of these, and was now writing by the next; that many strange things had happened to him, and he was lodged in the house of the Governor-General; that his father's death had touched him very deeply; being brought about by a mischance that so nearly affected himself; that the sad fact, so far from leaving him free to return home, seemed to make it the more necessary that he should remain where he was until he had done what he had been sent to do: and, finally, that what that work was he could not tell in a letter, but only by word of mouth, whenever it pleased God that they should meet again. This, with many words of affection for Adam himself, in thanksfor his fatherly anxiety, and some mention of Greeba in tender but guarded terms, was the sum of the only letter that had come from Michael Sunlocks in the four years after Stephen Orry's death to the first of the events that are now to be recorded.
And throughout these years Jason had lived at Lague, having been accepted as housemate by the six Fairbrothers, when the ship-broken men had gone their own ways on receiving from their Dublin owners the wages that were due to them. Though his relation to Stephen Orry had never become known, it had leaked out that he had come into Orry's money. He had done little work. His chief characteristics had been love of liberty and laziness. In the summer he had fished on the sea and in the rivers and he had shot and hunted in the winter. He had followed these pursuits out of sheer love of an idle life; but if he had a hobby it was the collecting of birds. Of every species on the island, of land or seafowl, he had found a specimen. He stuffed his birds with some skill, and kept them in the little hut in Port-y-Vullin.
The four years had developed his superb physique, and he had grown to be a yet more magnificent creature than Stephen Orry himself. He was rounder, though his youth might have pardoned more angularity; broader, and more upright, with a proud poise of head, long wavy red hair, smooth cheeks, solid white teeth, face of broad lines, an intelligent expression, and a deep voice that made the mountain ring. His dress suited well his face and figure. He wore a skin cap with a peak, a red woollen shirt belted about the waist, breeches of leather, leggings and seaman's boots. The cap was often awry, and a tuft of red hair tumbled over his bronzed forehead, his shirt was torn, his breeches were stained, and his leggings tied with rope; but rough, and even ragged, as his dress was, it sat upon him with a fine rude grace. With a knife in his sheath, a net or a decoy over his arm, a pouch for powder slung behind him, a fowling piece across his shoulder, and a dog at his heels, he would go away into the mountains as the evening fell. And in the early gleams of sunrise he would stride down again and into the "Hibernian," scenting up the old tavern with tobacco smoke, and carrying many dead birds at his belt, with the blood still dripping from their heads hung down. Folks called him Red Jason, or sometimes Jason the Red.
He began to visit Government House. Greeba was there, but at first he seemed not to see her. Simple greetings he exchanged with her, and that was all the commerce between them. With the Governor, when work was over, he sat and smoked, telling of his own country and its laws, and the ways of its people, talking of his hunting and fishing, calling the mountains Jokulls, and the Tynwald the Löberg, and giving names of his own to the glens, the Chasm of Ravens for the Dhoon, and Broad Shield for Ballaglass. And Adam loved to learn how close was the bond between his own dear isle and the land of the great sea kings of old time, but most of all he listened to what Jason said, that he might thereby know what kind of world it was wherein his dear lad Michael Sunlocks had to live away from him.
"A fine lad," Adam Fairbrother would say to Greeba; "a lad of fearless courage, and unflinching contempt of death, with a great horror of lying and treachery, and an inborn sense of justice. Not tender and gentle with his strength, as my own dear Sunlocks is, but of a high and serious nature, and having passions that may not be trifled with." And hearing this, and the more deliberate warning of her brothers at Lague, Greeba would remember that she had herself the best reason to know that the passions of Jason could be terrible.
But nothing she recked of it all, for her heart was as light as her manners in those days, and if she thought twice of her relations with Jason sherememberedthat she was the daughter of the Governor, and he was only a poor sailor lad who had been wrecked off their coast.
Jason was a great favorite with Mrs. Fairbrother, notwithstanding that he did no work. Rumor had magnified the fortune that Stephen Orry had left him, and the two hundred pounds stood at two thousand in her eyes. With a woman's quick instinct she saw how Jason stood towards Greeba, almost before he had himself become conscious of it, and she smiled on him and favored him. A whisper of this found its way from Lague to Government House, and old Adam shook his head. He had nothing against Jason, except that the lad was not fond of work, and whether Jason was poor or rich counted for very little, but he could not forget his boy Sunlocks.
Thus while Greeba remained with her father there was but little chance that she could wrong the promise she had made to Michael; but events seemed to force her into thearms of Jason. Her mother had never been of an unselfish spirit, and since parting from her husband she had shown a mean penuriousness. This affected her six sons chiefly, and they realized that when she had taken their side against their father she had taken the cream of their living also. Lague was now hers for her lifetime, and only theirs after she was done with it; and if they asked much more for their work than bed and board she reminded them of this, and bade them wait. Soon tiring of their Lenten entertainment, they trooped off, one after one, to their father, badly as they had dealt by him, and complained loudly of the great wrong he had done them when he made over the lands of Lague to their mother. What were they now, though sons of the Governor? No better than hinds on their mother's farm, expected to work for her from light to dusk, and getting nothing for their labor but the house she kept over their heads. Grown men they all were now, and the elder of them close on their prime, yet none were free to marry, for none had the right to a penny for the living he earned; and all this came of their father's unwise generosity.
Old Adam could not gainsay them, and he would not reproach them, so he did all that remained to him to do, and that was to exercise a little more of the same unwise generosity, and give them money. And finding this easy means of getting what they wanted, they came again and again, all six of them, from Asher to Gentleman Johnny, and as often as they came they went away satisfied, though old Adam shook his head when he saw how mean and small was the spirit of his sons. Greeba also shook her head, but from another cause, for though she grudged her brothers nothing she knew that her father was fast being impoverished. Once she hinted as much, but old Adam made light of her misgivings, saying that if the worst came to the worst he had still his salary, and what was the good of his money if he might not use it, and what was the virtue of charity if it must not begin at home?
But the evil was not ended there for the six lumbering men who objected to work without pay were nothing loth to take pay without work. Not long after the first of the visits to Government House, Lague began to be neglected.
Asher lay in the ingle and dozed; Thurstan lay about in the "Hibernian" and drank; Ross and Stean started a ring of gamecocks, Jacob formed a nest of private savings, andJohn developed his taste for dress and his appetite for gallantries. Mrs. Fairbrother soon discovered the source of the mischief, and railed at the name of her husband, who was ruining her boys and bringing herself to beggary.
Thus far had matters gone, during the four years following the death of Stephen Orry, and then a succession of untoward circumstances hastened a climax of grave consequence to all the persons concerned in this history. Two bad seasons had come, one on the end of the other. The herring fishing had failed, and the potato crop had suffered a blight. The fisher folk and the poor farming people were reduced to sore straits. The one class had to throw the meal bag across their shoulders and go round the houses begging, and the other class had to compound with their landlords or borrow from their neighbors.
Where few were rich and many were poor, the places of call for either class were not numerous. But two houses at least were always open to those who were in want—Lague and Government House; though their welcome at the one was very unlike their welcome at the other. Mrs. Fairbrother relieved their necessities by lending them money on mortgage on their lands or boats, and her interest was in proportion to their necessities. They had no choice but accept her terms, however rigid, and if in due course they could not meet them they had no resource but to yield up to her their little belongings. In less than half a year boat after boat, croft after croft, and even farm after farm had fallen into her hands. She grew rich, and the richer she grew the more penurious she became. There were no banks in the north of the island then, and the mistress of Lague was in effect the farmer's banker.
Government House, in the south of the island, had yet more applicants; but what the Governor had he gave, and when his money was gone he served out orders on the millers for meal and the weavers for cloth. It soon became known that he kept open house to the poor, and from north and south, east and west, the needy came to him in troops, and with them came the idle and the dissolute. He knew the one class from the other, yet railed at both in threatening words, reproaching their improvidence and predicting his own ruin, but he ended by giving to all alike. They found out his quarter-day and came in throngs to meet it, knowing that, bluster as he would, while the good man had money he was sure to give it to all who asked. The sorrytroop, good and bad, worthy and unworthy, soon left him without a pound. He fumed at this when Greeba cast up his reckoning, but comforted himself with the thought that he had still his stipend of five hundred pounds a year coming in to him, however deeply it might be condemned beforehand.
At the first pinch of his necessity his footman deserted him and after the footman went the groom.
"They say the wind is tempered to the shorn sheep, Greeba," said he, and laughed.
He had always stood somewhat in awe of these great persons, and his spirits rose visibly at the loss of them, for he had never yet reconciled himself to the dignity of his state.
"It's wonderful how much a man may do for himself when he's put to it," he said, as he groomed his own horse next morning. His sons were not so easily appeased, and muttered hard words at his folly, for their own supplies had by thistimesuffered curtailment. He was ruining himself at a breakneck pace, and if he came to die in the gutter, who should say that it had not served him right? The man who threw away his substance with his eyes open deserved to know by bitter proof that it had gone. Jason heard all this at the fireside at Lague, and though he could not answer it, he felt his palms itch sorely, and his fists tighten like ribs of steel, and his whole body stiffen up and silently measure its weight against that of Thurstan Fairbrother, the biggest and heaviest and hardest-spoken of the brothers. Greeba heard it, too, but took it with a gay lightsomeness, knowing all yet fearing nothing.
"What matter?" she said, and laughed.
But strange and silly enough were some of the shifts that her father's open-handedness put her to in these bad days of the bitter need of the island's poor people.
It was the winter season, when things were at their worst, and on Christmas Eve Greeba had a goose killed for their Christmas dinner. The bird was hung in one of the out-houses, to drain and cool before being plucked, and while it was there Greeba went out, leaving her father at home. Then came three of the many who had never yet been turned empty from the Governor's door. Adam blustered at all of them, but he emptied his pockets to one, gave the goose to another, and smuggled something out of the pantry for the third.
The goose was missed by the maid whose work it was to pluck it, and its disappearance was made known to Greeba on her return. Guessing at the way it had gone, she went into the room where her father sat placidly smoking, and trying to look wondrous, serene and innocent.
"What do you think, father?" she said; "someone has stolen the goose."
"I'm afraid, my dear," he answered, meekly, "I gave it away to poor Kinrade, the parish clerk. Would you believe it, he and his good old wife hadn't a bit or a sup for their Christmas dinner?"
"Well," said Greeba, "you'll have to be content with bread and cheese for your own, for we have nothing else in the house now."
"I'm afraid, my dear," he stammered, "I gave away the cheese too. Poor daft Gelling, who lives on the mountains, had nothing to eat but a loaf of bread, poor fellow."
Now the rapid impoverishment of theGovernorwas forcing Greeba into the arms of Jason, though they had yet no idea that this was so; and when the crisis came that loosened the ties which held Greeba to her father, it came as a surprise to all three of them.
The one man in the island who had thus far shown a complete indifference to the sufferings of the poor in their hour of tribulation was the Bishop of Sodor and Man. This person was a fashionable ecclesiastic—not a Manxman—a Murray, and a near kinsman of the Lord of the Island, who had kept the See four years vacant that the sole place of profit in the island might thereby be retained for his own family. Many years the Bishop had drawn his stipend, tithe and glebe rents, which were very large in proportion to the diocese, and almost equal in amount to the emoluments of the whole body of the native clergy. He held small commerce with his people, and the bad seasons troubled him little until he felt the pinch of them himself. But when he found it hard to gather his tithe he began to realize that the island was passing through sore straits. Then he sold his tithe charges by auction in England, and they were knocked down to a Scotch factor—a hard man, untroubled by sentiment, and not too proud to get his own by means that might be thought to soil the cloth of a Bishop.
When news of this transfer reached the island the Manx clergy looked black, though they dared say nothing; but thepoor people grumbled audibly, for they knew what was coming. It soon came, in the shape of writs from the Bishop's seneschal, served by the Bishop's sumner. Then the cry of the poor reached theGovernorat Castletown. No powers had he to stay the seizure of goods and stock, for arrears that were forfeit to the Church Courts, but he wrote to the Bishop, asking him to stay execution at such a moment of the island's necessity. The Bishop answered him curtly that the matter was now outside his control. At that the Governor inquired into the legality of the sale, and found good reason to question it. He wrote again to the Bishop, hinting at his doubts, and then the Bishop told him to mind his own business. "My business is the welfare of the people," the Governor answered, "and be you Bishop or Lord, or both, be sure that while I am here I will see to it."
"Such is the penalty of setting a beggar on horseback," the Bishop rejoined.
Meantime the Scotch factor went on with his work, and notices were served that if arrears of tithe rent were not paid by a given date, cattle or crop to the value of them would then be seized in the Bishop's name. When the word came to Government House, the Governor announced to Greeba his intention to be present at the first seizure. She tried to restrain him, fearing trouble; but he was fully resolved. Then she sent word by old Chalse A'Killey to her brothers at Lague, begging them to go with their father and see him through, but one and all refused. There was mischief brewing, and if the Governor had a right to interfere, he had a right to have the civil forces at the back of him. If he had no right to the help of Castle Rushen he had no right to stop the execution. In any case, they had no wish to meddle.
When old Chalse brought back this answer, Red Jason chanced to be at Castletown. He had been at Government House oftener than usual since the clouds had begun to hang on it. Coming down from the mountains, with his pipe in his mouth, his fowling piece over his shoulder, and his birds hanging from his belt, he would sometimes contrive to get up into the yard at the back, fling down a brace of pheasants on to the kitchen floor, and go off again without speaking to anyone. Greeba had been too smart for him this time, and he was standing before her with a look of guilt when Chalse came up on his errand. Then Jason heard all, andstraightway offered to go with the Governor, and never let wit of his intention.
"Oh, thank you, thank you!" said Greeba, and she looked up into his bronzed face and smiled proudly, and her long lashes blinked over her beautiful eyes. Her glance seemed to go through him. It seemed to go through all nature; and fill the whole world with a new, glad light.
The evil day came, and the Governor was as good as his word. He went away to Peel, where the first seizure was to be made. There a great crowd had already gathered, and at sight of Adam's face a great shout went up. The factor heard it, as he came on from Bishop's Court with a troop of his people about him. "I'll mak' short shrift of a' that, the noo," he said. When he came up he ordered that a cow house door should be opened and the cattle brought out for instant sale, for he had an auctioneer by his side. But the door was found to be locked, and he shouted to his men to leap on to the roof and strip off the thatch. Then the Governor cried "Stop," and called on the factor to desist, for though he might seize the cattle there would be no sale that day, since no man there present would take the bread out of the mouths of the poor.
"Then they shall try the milk," said the factor, with a hoarse laugh, and at the same moment the Bishop's seneschal, a briefless advocate, stepped out, pushed his hot face into Adam's, and said that, Governor as he was, if he encouraged the people to resist, the sumner should there and then summon him to appear before the Church Courts for contempt.
At that insult the crowd surged around, muttering deep oaths, and factor and seneschal were both much hustled. In another moment there was a general struggle; people were shouting, the Governor was on the ground and in danger of being trodden under foot, the factor had drawn a pistol, and some of his men were flourishing hangers.
By this time Red Jason had lounged up, as if by chance, to the outskirts of the crowd, and now he pushed through with great strides, lifted the Governor to his feet, laid the factor on the broad of his back, and clapped his pistol hand under one heavy heel. Then the hangers flashed round Jason's face, and he stretched his arms and laid out about him. In two minutes he had made a wide circle where he stood, and in two minutes more the factor and his men,with seneschal, sumner, auctioneer, and all the riffraff of the Church Courts, were going off up the road with best foot foremost, and a troop of the people, like a pack of hounds at full cry, behind.
Then the remnant of the crowd compared notes and bruises.
"Man alive, what a boy to fight," said one.
"Who was it?" said another.
"Och, Jason the Red, of coorse," said a third.
Jason was the only man badly injured. He had a deep cut over the right brow, and though the wound bled freely he made light of it. But Adam was much troubled at the sight.
"I much misdoubt me but we'll rue the day," he said.
Jason laughed at that, and they went back to Castletown together. Greeba saw them coming, and all but fainted at the white bandage that gleamed across Jason's forehead; but he bade her have no fear, for his wound was nothing. Nevertheless she must needs dress it afresh, though her deft fingers trembled woefully, and, seeing how near the knife had come to the eye, all her heart was in her mouth. But he only laughed at the bad gash, and thought with what cheer he would take such another just to have the same tender hands bathe it, and stitch it, and to see the troubled heaving of the round bosom that was before him while his head was held down.
"Aren't you very proud of yourself, Jason?" she whispered softly, as she finished.
"Why proud?" said he.
"It's the second time you have done as I have bidden you, and suffered for doing so," she said.
He knew not what reply to make, scarcely realizing which way her question tended. So, feeling very stupid, he said again,
"But why proud?"
"Aren't you, then?" she said. "BecauseIam proud of you."
They were alone, and he saw her breast heave and her great eyes gleam, and he felt dizzy. At the next instant their hands touched, and then his blood boiled, and before he knew what he was doing he had clasped the beautiful girl in his arms, and kissed her on the lips and cheek. She sprang away from him, blushing deeply, but he knew that she was not angry, for she smiled through her deep richcolor, as she fled out of the room on tiptoe. From that hour he troubled his soul no more with fears that he was unworthy of Greeba's love, for he looked at his wound in the glass, and remembered her words, and laughed in his heart.
The Governor was right that there would be nosalefor arrears of tithe charges. After a scene at Bishop's Court the factor went back to England, and no more was heard of the writs served by the sumner. But wise folks predicted a storm for Adam Fairbrother, and the great people were agreed that his conduct had been the maddest folly.
"He'll have to take the horns with the hide," said Deemster Lace.
"He's a fool that doesn't know which side his bread is buttered," said Mrs. Fairbrother.
The storm came quickly, but not from the quarter expected.
Since the father of the Duke of Athol had sold his fiscal rights to the English Crown the son had rued the bargain. All the interest in the island that remained to him lay in his title, his patronage of the Bishopric, and his Governor-Generalship. His title counted for little, for it was unknown at the English Court, and the salary of his Governor-Generalship counted for less, for, not being resident in the island, he had to pay a local Governor. The patronage of the Bishopric was the one tangible item of his interest, and when the profits of that office were imperilled he determined to part with his truncated honors. Straightway he sold them bag and baggage to the Crown, for nearly six times as much as his father had got for the insular revenues. When this neat act of truck and trade was complete he needed his deputy no more, and sent Adam Fairbrother an instant warning, with half-a-year's salary for smart money.
The blow came with a shock on Greeba and her father, but there was no leisure to sigh over it. Government House and its furniture belonged to the Government, and the new Governor might take possession of it at any moment. But the stock on its lands was Adam's and as it was necessary to dispose of it, he called a swift sale. Half the island came to it, and many a brave brag came then from many a vain stomach. Adam was rightly served! What was there to expect when jacks were set in office? With five hundred a year coming in for twenty years hewas as poor as a church mouse? Aw, money in the hands of some men was like water in a sieve!
Adam's six sons were there, looking on with sneering lips, as much as to say, "Let nobody blame us for a mess like this." Red Jason was there, too, glooming as black as a thundercloud, and itching to do battle with somebody if only a fit case would offer.
Adam himself did not show his face. He was ashamed—he was crushed—he was humiliated—but not for the reason attributed to him by common report. Alone he sat, and smoked and smoked, in the room at the back, from whence he had seen Greeba and Michael Sunlocks that day when they walked side by side into the paved yard, and when he said within himself, "Now, God grant that this may be the end of all parting between them and me." He was thinking of that day now: that it was very, very far away. He heard the clatter of feet below, and the laughter of the bidders and the wondrous jests of the facetious auctioneer.
When the work was over, and the house felt quiet and so, so empty, Greeba came in to him, with eyes large and red, and kissed him without saying a word. Then he became mighty cheerful all at once, and bade her fetch out her account books, for they had their own reckoning yet to make, and now was the time to make it. She did as she was bidden, and counted up her father's debts, with many a tear dropping over them as if trying to blot them out forever. And meanwhile he counted up his half-year's smart money, and the pile of silver and gold that had come of the sale. When all was reckoned, they found they would be just fifteen pounds to the good, and that was now their whole fortune.
Next morning there came a great company of the poor, and stood in silence about the house. They knew that Adam had nothing to give, and they came for nothing; they on their part had nothing to offer, and they had nothing to say; but this was their way of showing sympathy with the good man in his dark hour.
The next morning after that old Adam said to Greeba,
"Come, girl, there is only one place in the island that we have a right to go to, and that's Lague. Let's away."
And towards Lague they set their faces, afoot, all but empty-handed, and with no one but crazy old Chalse A'Killey for company.
It was early summer, and the day was hot; there had been three weeks of drought, and the roads were dusty. Adam walked with a stout blackthorn stick, his flaccid figure sometimes swaying for poise and balance, and his snow-white hair rising gently in the soft breeze over his tender old face, now ploughed so deep with labor and sorrow. Chalse was driving his carrier's cart, whereon lay all that was left of Adam's belongings, save only what the good man carried in his purse. And seeing how heavy the road was to one of Adam's years, though his own were hardly fewer, poor old Chalse, recking nothing of dignity lost thereby, would have had him to mount the shafts and perch on the box behind the pony's tail. But Adam, thinking as little of pride, said No, that every herring should hang by its own gills, and the pony had its full day's work before it; moreover, that it was his right to walk at his own expense now, having ridden twenty years at the expense of the island. So he kept the good blackthorn moving, and Greeba stepped along nimbly by his side. And when the Castletown coach overtook and passed them on its way to Douglas, and some of the farming folk who rode on it leaned over saucily and hailed Adam by his Christian name, he showed no shame or rancor, until, when the coach was gone, he caught a glimpse of the hot color that had mounted to Greeba's cheeks. Then, without a word, he turned his mellow old face to his feet, and strode along a good half mile in silence.
And meantime, Chalse, thinking to lighten the burden of the way with cheerful talk, rattled along in his crazy screech on many subjects, but found that all came round, by some strange twist, to the one subject that might not be discussed. Thus, looking at his pony, he told of the donkey he had before it, the same that Michael Sunlocks rode long years ago; how he himself had fallen sick and could not to keep it, and so gave it without a penny to aneighbor for feeding it; and how when he got better he wanted to borrow it, but the neighbor, in base ingratitude and selfishness, would not lend it without pay.
"Faith, it's alwis lek that," said Chalse. "Give a man yer shirt, and ye must cut yer lucky or he'll be after axing ye for yer skin."
When they came by Douglas, Chalse was for skirting round by the Spring Valley through Braddon, but old Adam, seeing his drift, would not pretend to be innocent of it, and said that if there were dregs in his cup he was in the way of draining them without making too many wry faces about it. And as for the people of the town, if they thought no shame to stare at him he thought no shame to be stared at, yet that what was good enough for himself might not be so for one who had less deserved it, and Greeba could go with Chalse by Braddon, and they would meet again on Onchan Hill.
To this Greeba would not consent; and as it chanced there was little need, for when they got into Douglas the town was all astir with many carriages and great troops of people making for the quay, so that no one seemed so much as to see the little company of three that came covered with dust out of the country roads.
"Aw, bad cess, what jeel is this?" said Chalse; and before they had crossed the little market place by the harbor, where the bells of old St. Matthew's rang out a merry peal, they learned for certain the cause of the joyful commotion; for there they were all but run down by the swaying and surging crowds, that came shouting and cheering by the side of an open carriage, wherein sat a very old gentleman in the uniform of a soldier. It was, as Adam had already divined, the new Governor-General, Colonel Cornelius Smelt, newly arrived that day in the island as the first direct representative of the English crown in succession to the Lords of Man. And at that brave sight poor old Chalse, who jumbled in his distraught brain the idea of Adam's late position with that of his master the Duke of Athol, and saw nothing but that this gentleman, in his fine rigging, was come in Adam's place, and was even now on his way to Castletown to take possession of Government House, and that the bellowing mob that not a month before had doffed their caps before Adam's face, now shoved him off the pavement without seeing him, stamped and raved and shook his fist over the people, as if he would brain them.
They slept at Onchan that night, and next day they reached Kirk Maughold. And coming on the straggling old house at Lague, after so long an absence, Adam was visibly moved, saying he had seen many a humiliation since the days when he lived in it, and might the Lord make them profitable to his soul; but only let it please God to grant him peace and content and daily bread, and there should be no more going hence in the years that were left to him.
At that Greeba felt a tingling on both sides her heart, for her fears were many of the welcome that awaited them.
It was nigh upon noon, and the men were out in the fields; but Mrs. Fairbrother was at home, and she saw the three when they opened the gate and came down under the elms.
"Now, I thought as much," she said within herself, "and I warrant I know their errand."
Adam entered the house with what cheer of face he could command, being hard set to keep back his tears, and hailed his wife in a jovial tone, although his voice threatened to break, and sat himself down in his old seat by the chimney corner, with his blackthorn stick between his knees and his hands resting upon it. But Mrs. Fairbrother made no answer to his greeting, and only glanced from him to Greeba who tripped softly behind him, and from Greeba to Chalse, who came shambling in after them, vacantly scratching his uncovered head. Then, drawing herself up, and holding back her skirts, she said very coldly, while her wrinkled face twitched—
"And pray what ill wind blows you here?"
"An ill wind indeed, Ruth," Adam answered, "for it is the wind of adversity. You must have heard of our misfortune since the whole island knows of it. Well, it is not for me to complain, for God shapes our ways, and He knows what is best. But I am an old man now, Ruth, little able to look to myself, still less to another, and——"