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.”