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HALL CAINE'S BEST BOOKS
IN THREE VOLUMES
VOLUME III
A Son of Hagar
She's All The World to Me
BY
HALL CAINE
ILLUSTRATED
P. F. COLLIER & SON
NEW YORK
SHE'S ALL THE WORLD TO ME
PROEM
This is the story of how a woman's love triumphed over neglect and
wrong, and of how the unrequited passion in the great heart of a boy
trod its devious paths in the way to death, until it stood alone with
its burden of sin before God and the pitiless deep.
In the middle of the Irish Sea there is, as every one knows, an island
which for many ages has had its own people, with their own language and
laws, their own judges and governor, their own lords and kings, their
own customs and superstitions, their own proverbs and saws, their own
ballads and songs. On the west coast of the Isle of Man stands the town
of Peel. Though clean and sweet, it is not even yet much of a place to
look at with its nooks and corners, its blind lanes and dark alleys, its
narrow, crooked, crabbed streets. Thirty-five years ago it was a poor
little hungry fishing port, chill and cheerless enough, staring straight
out over miles and miles of bleak sea. To the north of Peel stretches a
broad shore; to the south lies the harbor with a rocky headland and bare
mountain beyond. In front--divided from the mainland by a narrow
strait--is a rugged island rock, on which stand the ruins of a castle.
At the back rises a gentle slope dotted over with gray houses.
This is the scene of the following history of the love that was won and
the love that was lost, of death that had no sting and the grave that
had no victory. Wild and eery as the coast on which I learned it is this
story of love and death; but it is true as Truth and what it owes to him
who writes it now with feelings deeper than he can say is less than it
asks of all by whom it is read in sympathy and simple faith.
CHAPTER I
MYLREA BALLADHOO
The season was early summer; the year 1850. The morning had been bright
and calm, but a mist had crept up from the sea as the day wore on, and
the night, when it came, was close, dark, and dumb. Laden with its salt
scent, the dank vapor had enveloped an old house on the "brew" behind
the town. It was a curious place--ugly, long, loose, and straggling. One
might say it was a featureless and irresolute old fabric. Over the porch
was printed, "Prepare to meet thy God." It was called Balladhoo, and,
with its lands, it had been for ages the holding of the Mylreas, an
ancient Manx family, once rich and consequently revered, now notoriously
less wealthy and proportionately more fallible.
In this house there was a parlor that faced the bay and looked out
towards the old castle and the pier at the mouth of the harbor. Over the
mantel-piece was carved "God's Providence is Mine Inheritance." One
might add that it was a melancholy old mansion.
A gentleman was busy at a table in the bay window sorting and arranging
papers by the last glimmering daylight. He was a man of sixty-five,
stout, yet flaccid, and slack, and wearing a suit of coarse blue
homespun that lay loosely upon him. His white hair hung about a face
that bespoke an unusual combination of traits. The eyes and forehead
were full of benevolence, but the mouth was alternately strong and weak,
harsh and tender, uncertain whether the proper function of its mobile
corners was to turn up in laughter or down in disdain.
This was Evan Mylrea, member of the House of Keys, Harbor Commissioner,
and boat-owner, philanthropist and magistrate, coroner, constable and
"local" for the Wesleyan body, and commonly known by his surname coupled
with the name of his estate--Mylrea Balladhoo. Mylrea Balladhoo did not
belie his face. He was the sort of man who gives his dog one blow for
snapping at his hand, and then two more for not coming back to be
caressed. Rightly understood, the theory of morals that an act like this
implies tells the whole story of Mylrea's life and character, so far as
either of these concerns the present history. It was the rule on which
this man, now grown old, had lived with the young, reckless,
light-hearted, thoughtless, beautiful, and darling wife whom he had
brought from England thirty years ago, and buried at home five years
afterwards. It was the principle on which he had brought up her only
son.
Just now there came from some remote part of the house the most doleful
wails that ever arrested mortal ears. At times they resembled the scream
of the cormorant as he wheels over a rock at sea. At other times they
recalled more precisely the plaintive appeal of the tailless tabby when
she is pressed hard for time and space. Mylrea Balladhoo was conscious
of these noises. Glancing once at his face, you might have thought it
had dropped to a stern frown. Glancing twice, you must have seen that it
had risen to a broad grin. One might certainly say that this was a
gruesome dwelling.
There was a loud banging of doors, the distant screeches were suddenly
abridged; there was the tread of an uncertain foot in the passage
without, the door opened, and an elderly man entered, carrying a lamp,
which he placed on the table. It was James Quark, the gardener, commonly
called Jemmy Balladhoo. That mention of the cormorant was lucky; this
man's eyes had just the sea-bird's wild stare. The two little gray-green
globes of fire were, however, set in a face of the most flabby
amiability. His hair, which was thin and weak, traveled straight down
his forehead due for his eyes. In one hand he carried something by the
neck, which, as he entered, he made late and futile efforts to conceal
behind his back.
"It's Mr. Kerruish Kinvig, sir, that's coming up to see you," said the
man in a meek voice.
"Show him in," said Mylrea Balladhoo; "and, Jemmy," he added, shouting
in the man's ear, "for mercy's sake take that fiddle to the barn."
"Take him to the barn?" said Jemmy, with an affrighted stare. "Why, it's
coming here he is, this very minute."
"The fiddle, the fiddle!" shouted Mr. Mylrea. "I always had my doubts
about the music that's in it, and now I see there's none."
Jemmy took himself off, carrying his fiddle very tenderly in both hands.
He was all but stone deaf, poor fellow, and had never yet known the full
enjoyment of his own music. That's why he was so liberal of it with
people more happily endowed.
A big blustering fellow then dashed into the parlor without ceremony.
"Balladhoo," he shouted, in a voice that rang through the house, "why
don't you have the life of that howling demon? Here, take my clasp-knife
at it and silence it forever."
"It's gone to the barn," said Mylrea Balladhoo, quietly, in reply to
these bloodthirsty proposals.
The newcomer, Kerruish Kinvig, was a prosperous net-maker in Peel, and a
thorn in the side of every public official within a radius of miles. The
joy of his life was to have a delightful row with a magistrate, a
coroner, a commissioner, or perhaps a parson by preference. When there
was never a public meeting to be interrupted, never a "vestry" to be
broken up, Kerruish Kinvig became as flat and stale as an old dog, and
was forced to come up and visit his friend Mylrea Balladhoo, just by way
of keeping his hand in.
On the present occasion he had scarcely seated himself, when he leaped
up, rushed to the window, peered into the night, and shouted that the
light on the harbor pier was out once more. He declared that this was
the third time within a month; prophesied endless catastrophes; didn't
know for his part what in the name of common-sense the commissioners
were about; could swear that smuggling was going on under their very
noses.
"I'll have the law on the lot of you," bellowed Kinvig at the full pitch
of his voice, and meantime he helped himself to the whisky on the table,
and filled his pipe from the domestic bowl. "It's the truth, I'll fling
you all out," he shouted through a cloud of smoke.
"Eh, you'll have your fling," replied the unperturbed Mylrea.
Then, going to the door, the master of Balladhoo recalled the gardener.
From the subsequent conversation it appeared that, to prevent illicit
trading, the Imperial Government had been compelled to station a cutter
in every harbor of the island; that the cutter stationed at Peel, having
come by some injury a month ago, had been removed to England for
repairs, and had not yet been brought back. Kerruish Kinvig declared
that some gang of scoundrels, perceiving the incompetence of the home
officials, were availing themselves of the absence of the Government
ship to run vessels laden with contraband goods under the cover of the
darkness.
Jemmy came back, and Mr. Mylrea sent him to fetch his son Christian.
Jemmy went off for that purpose.
Some talk of the young man then ensued between his father and Kinvig. It
transpired that Christian had had a somewhat questionable career--was
his father's only son, and had well-nigh ruined the old man with debts
contracted during a mysterious absence of six years. Christian had just
returned home, and Mylrea Balladhoo, stern on the outside, tender at the
core, loving his son as the one thing left to him to love, had forgiven
everything--disgrace, ingratitude, and impoverishment--and taken back
the prodigal without a word.
And, in truth, there was something so winsome in the young fellow's
reckless, devil-may-care indifference that he got at the right side of
people's affections in spite of themselves. Only those who come close to
this type of character can recognise the rift of weakness or wilfulness,
or it may be of selfishness, that runs through the fair vein of so much
good-nature. And if Mylrea Balladhoo saw nothing, who then should
complain?
Now, Kerruish Kinvig was just as fond of Christian as anybody else, but
that was no just cause and impediment why he should hold his peace as to
the young man's manifold weaknesses. So it was--
"Look here, Balladhoo. I've something to say about that fine son of
yours, and it's middling strange too."
"Drop it, Kerruish," muttered Mylrea.
"So I will, but it's into your ear I'll drop it. Do you know he's
hanging round one of my net-makers--eh?"
"You're fond of a spell at the joking, Kerruish, but in a general way,
you know, a man doesn't like to look like a fool. You've got too much
fun in you, Kerruish; that's _your_ fault, and I've always said so."
There was a twinkle in the old man's eye, but it went off like summer
lightning. "Who is she?" he asked, in another tone.
"Mona Cregeen they're calling her," said Kinvig.
"What is she?"
"Don't I tell you--one of my net-makers!" thundered Kinvig.
"Who are her people? Where does she come from? What do you know about
her? What has Christian had to say to her--"
"Hold on; that's a middling tidy lot to begin with," shouted Kinvig.
Then it was explained that Mona Cregeen was a young woman of perhaps
three-and-twenty, who had recently come to Peel from somewhere in the
south of the island, accompanied by her aged mother and little sister, a
child of five, closely resembling her.
Jemmy, the gardener, returned to say that Christian was not at home;
left an hour ago; said he would be back before bedtime.
"Ah! it's the 'Jolly Herrings' he's off to," said Kinvig. The "Jolly
Herrings" was a low hovel of an inn down in the town.
"As I say, you've a fine feeling for the fun, Kerruish," said Mylrea;
"Jemmy, put on your coat quick. You have to carry a message to the
harbor-master. It can't wait for Master Christian."
Now, Jemmy Balladhoo had, as we have seen, one weakness, but it was not
work. He remembered quite opportunely that there was a boy in the
kitchen who had just come up on an errand from the town, and must of
course go back again. It was quite an inspiration, but none the less
plainly evident that the boy was the very person to carry the message to
the harbor-master.
"Who is he?" shouted Kerruish Kinvig.
"Danny Fayle," answered Jemmy.
"Pshaw! he'll never get there," bawled Kinvig.
"Bring him up," said Mylrea Balladhoo.
A minute later, a fisher-lad of eighteen shambled into the room. You
might have said he was long rather than tall. He wore a guernsey and
fumbled with a soft blue seaman's cap in one hand. His fair hair
clustered in tangled curls over his face, which was sweet and comely,
but had a simple vacant look from a lagging lower lip.
Danny was an orphan, and had been brought up none too tenderly by an
uncle and aunt. The uncle, Bill Kisseck, was admiral of the
fishing-fleet, and master of a fishing-lugger belonging to Mr. Mylrea.
To-morrow was to be the first day of the herring season, and it was
relative to that event that Danny had been sent up to Balladhoo. The lad
received from Mr. Mylrea, in his capacity as harbor commissioner, a
message of stern reproof and warning, which he was to convey to the
official whose lack of watchfulness had allowed the light on the harbor
pier to go out.
"Run straight to his house, Danny, my lad," said Mylrea Balladhoo.
"And don't go cooling your heels round that cottage of the Cregeens,"
put in Kerruish Kinvig.
A faint smile that had rested like a ray of pale sunshine on the lad's
simple face suddenly vanished. He hung his head, touched his forehead
with the hand holding the cap, and disappeared.