SUB NUBE
Glorious summer weather, gold on sea and land, but gloom of death and
dole on our hearts, and dark forebodings of what the future has in
store. I could hardly believe it possible that one night's agony could
work such a change in the appearance; but when, next morning, I saw the
face of Father Letheby, white and drawn, as if Sorrow had dragged his
rack over it, and the dark circles under his eyes, and the mute despair
of his mouth, I remembered all that I had ever read of the blanching of
hair in one night, and the dread metamorphoses that follow in the
furrows where Anguish has driven his plough. It appeared, then, that
between the buoyancy of the day's success, and the society of friends,
and the little excitements of the evening, he had not realized the
extent of his losses and responsibilities. But in the loneliness of
midnight it all came back; and he read, in flaming letters on the dark
background of his future, the one word: _Ruin_! And it was not the
financial and monetary bankruptcy that he dreaded, but the shame that
follows defeat, and the secret exultation that many would feel at the
toppling over of such airy castles and the destruction of such ambitious
hopes. He was young, and life had looked fair before him, holding out
all kinds of roseate promises; and now, at one blow, the whole is
shattered, and shame and disgrace, indelible as the biting of a burning
acid, was his for all the long years of life. It was no use to argue:
"You have done nothing wrong or dishonorable"; here was defeat and
financial ruin, and no amount of whitewashing by reason or argument
could cover the dread consequences.
"Come out," I cried, after we had talked and reasoned to no purpose;
"sufficient for the day is the evil thereof. Let us have a walk; and the
sea air will clear the cobwebs off our brains."
We strolled down by the sea, which to-day looked so calm and beautiful,
its surface fluted with grooves where the sunlight reposed, and the
colored plaits of the waves weaving themselves lazily until they broke
into the white lace-work of sandy shoals. Nothing was there to show the
pitiless capacity or the deep revenge it takes from time to time on its
helpless conquerors. As we passed down by the creek, the "Great House"
came into sight, all its blinds drawn and the white windows staring
blankly at the sea.
"This poor child has a heavier cross before her than you," I said.
"Yes, but hers shall be healed in time. But who will wipe out
dishonor?"
"I cannot see where the dishonor comes in," I replied. "You have neither
robbed nor embezzled."
"I am a hopeless insolvent," he said. "I am security, sole security, for
those men over at Kilkeel, whom I promised and guaranteed to safeguard.
That I am bound to do on every principle of honor."
"Well, looking at it in its worst aspect," I replied, "insolvency is not
dishonorable--"
"It is the very acme of dishonor in a priest," he said.
Then I saw the inutility of reason in such a case.
We dined together that evening; and just as the Angelus bell rang, we
heard the hootings and derisive shouts of the villagers after the new
hands that had been taken on at the factory. In a few minutes these poor
girls came to the door to explain that they could not return to work. It
was the last straw. For a moment his anger flamed up in a torrent of
rage against these miscreants whom he had saved from poverty. Then it
died down in meek submission to what he considered the higher decree.
"Never mind, girls," he said; "tell Kate Ginivan to close the room and
bring me the key."
That was all, except that a certain listener treasured up all this
ingratitude in his heart; and the following Sunday at both Masses, the
walls of Kilronan chapel echoed to a torrent of vituperation, an
avalanche of anger, sarcasm, and reproach, that made the faces of the
congregation redden with shame and whiten with fear, and made the ladies
of the fringes and the cuffs wish to call unto the hills to cover them
and the mountains to hide them.
* * * * *
Nothing on earth can convince the villagers that the shipwreck was an
accident and not premeditated.
"They saw us coming, and made for us. Sure we had a right to expect it.
They wanted to make us drunk at the fishing-fleet; but the cap'n wouldn't
lave 'em."
"You don't mean to say they dreaded your poor boat?"
"Dreaded? They don't want Irishmen anywhere. Sure, 't was only last
year, whin they wanted to start a steamer between Galway and
Newfoundland--the shortest run to America--the captain was bribed on his
first trip, and tho' there isn't nothing but ninety fathoms of blue
say-wather betune Arran and Salthill, he wint out of his way to find a
rock, three miles out av his coorse, and--he found it. The Liverpool min
settled Galway."
"And didn't the cap'n cry: 'Port! d--n you, port!' and they turned her
nose right on us."
"But they were kind when they picked you up?"
"So far as talking gibberish and pouring whiskey into us, they were; but
whin they landed us, one dirty frog-eater sang out:--
"It's addiyou, not O revwar!"
* * * * *
Just a week after these events, that is, the Wednesday after my great
sermon, which is now a respectable landmark, or datemark, at Kilronan, I
got the first letter from Bittra. Here it is, brief and pitiful:--
Hotel Bristol, Paris, Sunday.
Rev. dear Father Dan:--Here we are in the world's capital. The air
is so light that you should sift the heavy atmosphere of Kilronan a
hundred times to make it as soft and exhilarating. We ran through
London, seeing enough to make one wish to escape it; and we are
boulevarding, opera-seeing, picture-gallery-visiting, church-going
since. The churches are superb; but--the people! Fancy only two men
at Mass at Ste. Clotilde's, and these two leaned against a pillar
the whole time, even during the Elevation. I had a terrible
distraction; I couldn't help saying all the time: "If Father Dan
was here, he'd soon make ye kneel down;" and I fancied you standing
before them, and making them kneel down by one look. But the women
are pious. It's all beautiful; but I wish I were home again! Rex is
all kindness; but he's a little shocked at our French customs.
"Are these Catholics?" he says, and then is silent. How is dear
father? I fear he'll be lonesome without his _petite mignonne_.
Mind, you are hereby invited and commanded to dine every evening
with papa, and also Father Letheby. Love to St. Dolores! Tell Mrs.
Darcy I inquired for her. What havoc she would make of the cobwebs
here!
Dear Father Dan,
Always your affectionate child,
Bittra Ormsby.
P. S. Remember you dine with papa every day. No ceremony. He likes
to be treated _en bon camarade_! Isn't that good French?
"You never know what a pitiful thing human wisdom is," said Father
Letheby, one of these dismal days of suspense, "until you come to test
it in sorrow. Now, here's a writer that gives me most intense pleasure
when I have been happy; and I say to every sentence he writes: 'How
true! How beautiful! What superb analysis of human emotion and feeling!'
But now, it's all words, words, words, and the oil of gladness is dried
up from their bare and barren rhetoric. Listen to this:--
"'A time will come, must come, when we shall be commanded by
mortality not only to cease tormenting others, but also ourselves.
A time must come, when man, even on earth, shall wipe away most of
his tears, were it only from pride. Nature, indeed, draws tears out
of the eyes, and sighs out of the breath so quickly, that the wise
man can never wholly lay aside the garb of mourning from his body;
but let his soul wear none. For if it is ever a merit to bear a
small suffering with cheerfulness, so must the calm and patient
endurance of the worst be a merit, and will only differ in being a
greater one, as the same reason, which is valid for the forgiveness
of small injuries, is equally valid for the forgiveness of the
greatest.... Then let thy spirit be lifted up in pride, and let it
contemn the tear, and that for which it falls, saying: "Thou art
much too insignificant, thou every-day life, for the
inconsolableness of an immortal,--thou tattered, misshapen,
wholesale existence!" Upon this sphere, which is rounded with the
ashes of thousands of years, amid the storms of earth, made up of
vapors, in this lamentation of a dream, it is a disgrace that the
sigh should only be dissipated together with the bosom that gives
it birth, and that the tear should not perish except with the eye
from which it flows.'"
"It sounds sweetly and rhythmically," I replied, "but it rests on human
pride, which is a poor, sandy foundation. I would rather one verse of
the 'Imitation.' But he seems to be a good man and an eloquent one."
"He apologizes for the defects of philosophy," said Father Letheby. "He
says:--
"'We must not exact of philosophy that, with one stroke of the pen,
it shall reverse the transformation of Rubens, who, with one stroke
of his brush, changed a laughing child into a weeping one. It is
enough if it change the full mourning of the soul into
half-mourning; it is enough if I can say to myself, "I will be
content to endure the sorrow that philosophy has left me; without
it, it would be greater, and the gnat's bite would be the wasp's
sting."'
"Now, this is a tremendous admission from a philosopher in love with his
science. It shows that he cares for truth more than for mere wisdom--"
"Look here, young man, something has brightened you up; this is the
first day for the fortnight that you have condescended to turn your
thoughts away from the luxury of fretting."
"Ay, indeed," he said, and there was a faint halo around his face.
"Three things--work, Dolores, and my weekly hour. I have trampled all my
bitterness under the hoofs of hard work. I have my first chapter of 'The
Cappadocians' ready for the printer. I tell you work is a noble tonic.
It was the best thing Carlyle wrote,--that essay on Work. Then this
afflicted child shames me. She takes her crucifixion so gloriously. And
last, but not least, when I pass my hour before the Blessed
Sacrament--an hour is a long time, Father Dan, and you think of a lot of
things--and when all the Christian philosophy about shame, and defeat,
and suffering, and ignominy comes back to me, I assure you I have been
angry with myself, and almost loathe myself for being such a coward as
to whimper under such a little trial."
"Very good! Now, that's common sense. Have you heard from the Board?"
"Yes; that's all right. They are going to hold an investigation to try
and make that French steamer responsible, as I believe she is, for two
reasons: she was going full speed in the fog; and she should have
observed the rule of the road, or of the sea, that a steamer is always
bound to give way to a sailing vessel. And I am becoming thoroughly
convinced now, from all that I can hear, that it was no accident. I
should like to know what took that steamer away from the fleet, and five
miles out of her ordinary course. I'm sure the Board will mulct her
heavily."
"But has the Board jurisdiction over foreign vessels ten or twelve miles
from shore?"
"That I don't know. I wish Ormsby were home."
"So do I, except for the tragedy we'll have to witness with that poor
child."
"Have you heard lately?"
"Not since she wrote from Paris."
"Alice had a letter from Florence yesterday. Such a pitiful letter, all
about her father. There was a good deal that Alice did not
understand,--about Dante, and Savonarola, and the Certosa,--but she said
I'd explain it. Clearly she knows nothing as yet."
But the revelation was not long delayed, and it came about in this wise.
I had a letter--a long letter--from Bittra from Rome, in which she wrote
enthusiastically about everything, for she had seen all the sacred
places and objects that make Rome so revered that even Protestants call
it home and feel lonely when leaving it. And she had seen the Holy
Father, and got blessings for us all,--for her own father, for Daddy
Dan, for Dolores, for Father Letheby. "And," she wrote, "I cannot tell
you what I felt when I put on the black dress and mantelletta and veil,
which are _de rigueur_ when a lady is granted an audience with the Pope.
I felt that this should be my costume, not my travelling bridal dress;
and I would have continued to wear it but that Rex preferred to see me
dressed otherwise. But it is all delightful. The dear old ruins, the
awful Coliseum, where Felicitas and Perpetua suffered, as you often told
us; and here Pancratius was choked by the leopard; and there were those
dreadful emperors and prætors, and even Roman women, looking down at the
whole horrible tragedy. I almost heard the howl of the wild beasts, and
saw them spring forward, and then crouch and creep onwards towards the
martyrs. Some day, Rex says, we'll all come here together again--you,
and papa, and Father Letheby,--and we'll have a real long holiday, and
Rex will be our guide, for he knows everything, and _he'll charge
nothing_." Alas! her presentiment about the mourning dress was not far
from verification. They travelled home rapidly, up through Lombardy,
merely glancing at Turin and Milan and the Lakes. At Milan they caught
the Swiss mail, and passed up and through the mountains, emerging from
the St. Gothard tunnel just as a trainful of passengers burst from the
refreshment rooms at Goschenen and thronged the mail to Brindisi. Here
they rested; and here Bittra, anxious to hear English or Irish news,
took up eagerly the "Times" of a month past, that lay on a side table,
and, after a few rapid glances, read:--
"A sad accident occurred off the Galway coast, on Monday, June----.
The 'Star of the Sea,' a new fishing-smack, especially built for
the deep-sea fisheries, was struck on her trial trip by a French
steamer and instantly submerged. Her crew were saved, except
Captain Campion, the well-known yachtsman, who had taken charge of
the boat for the occasion. He must have been struck insensible by
the prow of the steamer, for he made no effort to save himself, but
sank instantly. As the disaster occurred ten miles from land, there
is no hope that his body will be recovered."
How she took the intelligence, her blank stare of horror, when Ormsby
entered the dining-room, whilst she could only point in mute despair to
the paper; how, the first shock over, she fell back upon the sublime
teachings of religion for consolation; and how the one thing that
concerned her most deeply manifested itself in her repeated exclamations
of prayer and despair: "His soul! his soul! poor papa!"--all this Ormsby
told us afterwards in detail. They hurried through Lucerne to Geneva,
from Geneva to Paris, from Paris home, travelling night and day, his
strong arm supporting her bravely, and he, in turn, strengthened in his
new-born faith by the tenderness of her affection and the sublimity of
her faith.
Of course, we knew nothing of all this whilst the days, the long days,
of July drew drearily along with cloudless skies, but, oh! such clouded
hearts! Suspense and uncertainty weighed heavily on us all. We did not
know what to-morrow might bring. Occasionally a visitor came over
through curiosity to see the theatre of the accident, shrug his
shoulders, wonder at the folly of young men, and depart with an air of
smug self-satisfaction. There were a few letters from the factory at
Loughboro', complaining and then threatening, and at last came a bill
for £96.0.0, due on the twelve machines, and an additional bill for
£30.0.0, due on material. Then I wrote, asking the proprietor to take
back machines and material, and make due allowance for both. I received
a courteous reply to the effect that this was contrary to all business
habits and customs. There the matter rested, except that one last letter
came, after a certain interval, peremptorily demanding payment and
threatening law proceedings.
One shamefaced, dreary deputation came to me from the young girls who
had been employed in the factory. They expressed all kinds of regrets
for what they had done, promised amendment, guaranteed steady work for
the future, would only ask half pay, would work for some weeks for
nothing even until the debts were paid off. I referred them briefly to
Father Letheby.
"They couldn't face him. If he was mad with them and scolded them, they
could bear it and be glad of it; but they couldn't bear to see his white
face and his eyes. Would I go and see him for them, and bring back the
key to Kate Ginivan?"
I did, and came back with a laconic _No_! Then for the first time they
understood that they had knocked their foolish heads against adamant.
"There's nothing for us, then, but America, your reverence," they said.
"It would be a good thing for the country if some of you went,
whatever," I said.
* * * * *
The following Sunday a deputation appeared in the village,--the good
merchants from Kilkeel, who had subscribed the balance of two hundred
pounds for the boat. They called just as Father Letheby was at
breakfast, immediately after his last Mass. He received them
courteously, but waited for what they had to say.
"That was an unfortunate thing about the boat, your reverence," said the
spokesman.
"Very much so, indeed," said Father Letheby.
"A great misfortune, entirely," said another, looking steadily at the
floor.
"We come to know, your reverence, what's going to be done," said the
foreman.
"Well, the matter lies thus, gentlemen," said Father Letheby. "The Board
of Trade is making careful investigations with a view to legal
proceedings; and, I understand, are sanguine of success. They hope to
make that steamer responsible for the entire amount."
"The law is slow and uncertain," said the foreman.
"And we understand that the crew do not even know the name of the
steamer that ran them down," said another.
"You may be sure, gentlemen," said Father Letheby, "that the Board will
leave nothing undone to secure their own rights and those of the
proprietors. They have already intimated to me that I shall be called
upon to prosecute in case the Inspector of the Board of Trade finds that
there was malice prepense or culpable negligence on the part of the
master of the steamer, and I am fully prepared to meet their wishes.
This means a prosecution, out of which, I am sanguine, we shall emerge
victorious; and then there will be no delay in discharging our
obligations to you individually."
"Live, horse, and you'll get grass," said one of the deputation
insolently, presuming on the quiet tone Father Letheby had assumed.
"'T is hunting for a needle in a bundle of straw," said another.
Father Letheby flushed up, but said nothing. The foreman assumed a calm,
magisterial air.
"You will remember, Reverend sir," he said, "that this subscription to
what some considered a Uropean[7] idea was not, I may say, advanced on
our part. It was only at your repeated solicitations, Reverend sir, that
we consented to advance this sum out of our hard earnings--"
"Hard enough, begor," said a member; "'t isn't by booklarnin', but by
honest labor, we got it."
"If you would kindly allow me, Mr. ----," said the foreman, in a
commiserating tone, "perhaps I could explain to the Reverend gentleman
our views in a more--in a more--in a more--satisfactory manner."
"There's simply nothing to be explained," said Father Letheby. "The boat
is at the bottom of the sea; I am responsible to you for two hundred
pounds. That's all."
"Pardon me, sir," said the eloquent foreman, who was nettled at the idea
that his oratory was not acceptable--and he had once proposed a Member
for Parliament--"pardon me, that is not all. We--a--are accustomed to
repose in our clergymen the highest, and indeed, I may add, the deepest
confidence. When that good lady--I quite forget her name, it is so long
since I read my classics--perhaps, sir, you could help me--ahem!"
"I am quite at a loss to know to what excellent lady you refer," said
Father Letheby.
"I'm very sorry to hear such a statement from the lips of a clergyman,"
said the foreman, with much severity; "for the lady to whom I refer is
the representative, and, indeed, the personification of Justice--"
"Oh, you mean 'Astræa,'" said Father Letheby.
"Quite so, sir," said the merchant, pompously. "When Astery left the
earth she took refuge in the Church."
"Indeed!" said Father Letheby, "I was not aware of that interesting
fact."
"Well, sir," said the merchant, nettled at this sarcastic coolness, "at
least we, laymen, are accustomed to think so. We have been taught to
repose unbounded confidence in our clergy--"
"And how have I forfeited that confidence?" said Father Letheby, who
began to see a certain deliberate insult under all this silliness.
"Well, you see, sir," he continued, "we relied on your word of honor,
and did not demand the usual securities for the advance of our money.
And now we find ourselves in a curious predicament--our money gone, and
no redress."
"You doubt my word of honor now?" said Father Letheby, who, to his own
seeming, had been a miracle of patience.
"We have been deceived, sir," said the merchant, grandly.
"Pray, how?" said Father Letheby. "You may not be aware of the meaning
of your language, nor of the usual amenities of civilized society, but
you should at least know that your language approaches very closely to
insult."
"We _have_ been deceived, sir," said the other, severely.
"Might I repeat my question, and ask you how?" said Father Letheby.
"We got the most repeated assurance, sir," said the merchant, "that this
boat would be a mine of wealth. Instead of that, it is, if I may so
speak, a tornado of ruin and misfortune. It lies, if I may use the
expression, at the bottom of the briny sea."
"To cut a long story short," said another of the deputation, "that boat
was a swindle from beginning to end, and I know it--"
"Pardon me, gentlemen," said Father Letheby, rising, "but I must now cut
short the interview, and ask you to retire--"
"Ask us to retire with our money in your pocket!"
"Turn us out, and we--"
"Now, gentlemen, there is no use in prolonging this unpleasantness. Be
good enough to leave my house. Lizzie, show these gentlemen the door."
He had touched the bell.
"We retire, sir, but we shall come again. We retreat, but we return.
Like Marius,"--the foreman was now in the street, and there was a pretty
fair crowd around the door,--"like Marius, like Marius--"
"Who the d----l would marry the likes of you, you miserable omadhaun,"
said Jem Deady, who knew by instinct that this was a hostile expedition.
"Give us de word, your reverence, and we'll chuck the whole bloomin' lot
into the say. It was many a long day since they had a bat', if we're to
judge by dere dirty mugs."
This was the signal for a fierce demonstration. In a moment the village
was in arms, men rushed for stones, women, hastily leaving the
dinner-tables, gathered up every kind of village refuse; and amidst the
din of execration and abuse the shopkeepers of Kilkeel climbed on their
cars and fled; not, however, without taking with them specimens, more or
less decayed, of the _fauna_ and _flora_ of Kilronan, in the shape of
eggs redolent of sulphuretted hydrogen, a few dead cats, and such
potatoes and other vegetables as could be spared from the Sunday dinner.
The people of Kilronan had, of course, a perfect right to annoy and
worry their own priests, especially in the cause of Trades-Unionism; but
the idea of a lot of well-dressed malcontents coming over from Kilkeel
to insult their beloved curate was simply intolerable.
Nevertheless, that lonely walk by the sea-cliffs that Sunday afternoon
was about the most miserable experience in Father Letheby's life. He did
not know whither to turn. Every taunt and insult of these ignorant men
came back to sting him. What would it be if the whole thing came to
publicity in the courts, and he was made the butt of unjust
insinuations by some unscrupulous barrister, or the object of the lofty,
moral indignation of the bench! Yet he felt bound, by every law of
honor, to pay these men two hundred pounds. He might as well be asked to
clear off the national debt. Now and again he paused in his walk, and,
leaning on his umbrella, scrutinized the ground in anxious reverie; then
he lifted up his eyes to the far horizon, beneath whose thin and misty
line boat and captain were sleeping. Then he went on, trying in vain to
choke down his emotion. "Star of the Sea! Star of the Sea!" he muttered.
Then, half unconsciously: "Stella maris! Stella maris!! Porta manes, et
stella maris, succurre cadenti surgere qui curat populo!"
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 7: "Utopian," I suppose, the poor man meant.]