Complete works of hall c.., p.150
Complete Works of Hall Caine, page 150
It was supper-time, though old Danny and old Jemmy were still at the looms. Old Juan had washed out a bowl of potatoes, filled the pot with them, hung them on the chimney hook and stirred the peats. Then to make them boil the quicker he had gone out with the tongs to the side of the house for some dry gorse from the gorse heap. While there he had peered through the darkness of the bay for the light on the Point of Ayre, and had missed it, and on going back he had said:
“It’s out again. That’s the third time inside a month. I’ll go bail something will happen yet.”
He had got no answer, and so sat down on the three-legged stool to feed the fire with gorse lifted on the tongs. When the potatoes had boiled he had carried them to the door to drain them, and then, with the click-clack of the levers behind him, he had thought he heard, over the deep boom and plash of the sea in front, a voice like a cry. Going indoors he had said, “Plague on the water-bailiff and commissioners and kays and councils. I’ll go bail there’s smuggling going on under their very noses. I’d have the law on the lot of them, so I would.”
Old Danny and old Jemmy knew the temper of their housemate — that he was never happy save when he had somebody to higgle with — so they paid no heed to his mutterings. But when Juan, having set the potatoes to steam with a rag spread over them, went out for the salt herrings, to where they hung to dry on a stick against the sunny side of the porch, he was sure that above the click of the levers, the boom and plash of the sea and the whistle of the wind, he could hear a clamorous shout of many voices, like a wild cry of distress. Then he hobbled back with a wizzened face of deadly pallor and told what he had heard, and the shuttles were stopped, and there was silence in the little house.
“It went by me same as the wind,” said old Juan.
“Maybe it was the nightman,” said old Danny.
At that old Jemmy nodded his head very gravely, and old Juan held on to the lever handles; and through those precious minutes when the crew of the schooner were fighting in the grip of death in the darkness, these three old men, their nearest fellow creatures, half dead, half blind, were held in the grip of superstitious fears.
“There again,” cried old Juan; and through the door that he had left open the cry came in above roar of wind and sea.
“It’s men that’s yander,” said old Jemmy.
“Ay,” said old Danny.
“Maybe it’s a ship on the Carick,” said old Juan.
“Let’s away and look,” said old Jemmy.
And then the three helpless old men, trembling and affrighted, straining their dim eyes to see and their deaf ears to hear, and clinging to each other’s hands like little children, groped their slow way to the beach. Down there the cries were louder than they had been on the brows above.
“Mercy me, let’s away to Lague for the boys,” said old Juan; and leaving behind them the voices that cried for help, the old men trudged and stumbled through the dark lanes.
Lague was asleep, but the old men knocked, and the windows were opened and night-capped heads thrust through. Very soon the house and courtyard echoed with many footsteps, and the bell over the porch rang out through the night, to call up the neighbors far and near.
Ross and Stean and Thurstan were the first to reach the shore, and there they found the crew of the Peveril landed — every man safe and sound, but drenching wet with the water they had passed through to save their lives. The schooner was still on the Carick, much injured already, plunging with every hurling sea on to the sharp teeth of the shoal beneath her, and going to pieces fast. And now that help seemed to be no more needed the people came flocking down in crowds — the Fairbrothers, with Greeba, and all their men and maids, Kane Wade the Methodist, with Chalse A’Killey, who had been sleeping the night at his house, Nary Crowe, and Matt Mylechreest and old Coobragh. And while Davy Kerruish shook the salt water from his sou’wester, and growled out to them with an oath that they had been a plaguy long time coming, and the skipper bemoaned the loss of his ship, and the men of their kits, Chalse was down on his knees on the beach, lifting up his crazy, cracked voice in loud thanksgiving. At that the growling ended, and then Asher Fairbrother, who had been the last to come, invited the ship-broken men to Lague, and all together they turned to follow him.
Just at that moment a cry was heard above the tumult of the sea. It was a wild shriek that seemed to echo in the lowering dome of the sky. Greeba was the first to hear it.
“There was some one left on the ship!” she cried.
The men stopped and looked into each other’s faces one by one.
“No,” said the skipper, “we’re all here.”
The cry was heard once more; it was a voice of fearful agony.
“That’s from Port-y-Vullin,” said Asher Fairbrother: and to Port-y-Vullin they all hastened off, following the way of the beach. There it was easy to see from whence the cries had come. An open fishing boat was laboring in the heavy sea, her stern half prancing like an unbroken horse, and her forepart jammed between two horns of the rock that forks out into the sea from Maughold Head. She had clearly been making for the little bay, when she had fallen foul of the shoal that lies to the north of it. Dark as the night was, the sea and sky were lighter than the black headland, and the figure of a man in the boat could be seen very plainly. He was trying to unship the mast, that he might lighten the little craft and ease her off the horns that held her like a vice, but every fresh wave drove her head deeper into the cleft, and at each vain effort he shouted again and again in rage and fear.
A boat was lying high and dry on the shore. Two of the Fairbrothers, Stean and Thurstan, ran it into the water, jumped into it, and pushed off. But the tide was still making, the sea was running high, a low ground swell was scooping up the shingle and flinging it through the air like sleet, and in an instant the boat was cast back on the shore. “No use, man,” shouted many voices.
But Greeba cried, “Help, help, help!” She seemed to be beside herself with suspense. Some vague fear, beyond the thought of a man’s life in peril, seemed to possess her. Did she know what it was? She did not. She dared not fix her mind upon it. She was afraid of her own fear. But, low down within her, and ready at any moment to leap to her throat, was the dim ghost of a dread that he who was in the boat, and in danger of his life on the rock, might be very near and dear to her. With her hood fallen back from her head to her shoulders, she ran to and fro among the men on the beach, crying, “He will be lost. Will no one save him?”
But the other women clung to the men, and the men shook their heads and answered, “He’s past saving,” and “We’ve got wives and childers lookin’ to us, miss — and what’s the use of throwing your life away?”
Still the girl cried “Help,” and then a young fellow pushed through to where she stood, and said, “He’s too near for us to stand here and see him die.”
“Oh, God bless and keep you forever and ever,” cried Greeba; and, lifted completely out of all self-control, she threw her arms about the young man and kissed him fervently on the cheek. It was Jason. He had found a rope and coiled one end of it about his waist, and held the other end in his hand. The touch of Greeba’s quivering lips had been as fire to him. “Lay hold,” he cried, and threw the loose end of the rope to Thurstan Fairbrother. At the next moment he was breast-high in the sea. The man must have seen him coming, for the loud clamor ceased.
“Brave lad!” said Greeba, in a deep whisper.
“Brave, is it? It’s mad, I’m calling it,” said old Davy.
“Who is it?” said the skipper.
“The young Icelander,” said Davy.
“Not the lad Jason?” ——
“Aw, yes, though — Jason — the gawk, as they’re saying. Poor lad there’s a heart at him.”
The people held their breath. Greeba covered her eyes with her hands, and felt an impulse to scream. Wading with strong strides, and swimming with yet stronger strokes, Jason reached the boat. A few minutes afterwards he was back on the shore, dragging the man after him.
The man lay insensible in Jason’s arms, bleeding from a wound in the head. Greeba stooped quickly to peer into his face in the darkness, and then rose up and turned away with a sigh that was like a sigh of relief.
“He’s done for,” said Jason, putting him down.
“Who is he?” cried a score of voices.
“God knows; fetch a lantern,” said Jason.
“See, there’s a light in old Orry’s hut yonder. Let’s away there with him. It will be the nearest place,” said Kane Wade.
Then shoulder-high they raised the insensible man and carried him to Stephen Orry’s hut.
“What a weight he is!” said Kane Wade. “Slip along, somebody, and get the door opened.”
Chalse A’Killey ran on ahead.
“Where’s Stephen, to-night, that he’s not out with us at work same as this?” said Matt Mylechreest.
“He’s been down here all week,” puffed Nary Crowe.
In another minute Chalse was knocking at the door, and calling loudly as he knocked:
“Stephen! Stephen! Stephen Orry!”
There came no answer, and he knocked again and called yet louder:
“Stephen, let us in. There’s a man here dying.”
But no one stirred within the house. “He’s asleep,” said one.
“Stephen — Stephen Orry — Stephen Orry — wake up, man — can’t you hear us? Have you no bowels, that you’d keep the man out?”
“He’s not at home — force the door,” Kane Wade shouted.
One blow was enough. The door was fastened only by a hemp rope wound around a hasp on the outside, and it fell open with a crash. Then the men with the burden staggered into the house. They laid the insensible man on the floor, and there the light of the lamp that burned in the window fell upon his face.
“Lord-a-massy!” they cried, “it’s Stephen Orry hisself.”
CHAPTER X.
The End of Orry.
When the tumult was over, and all lives appeared to be saved, and nothing seemed lost save the two vessels — the schooner and the yawl, which still rose and fell on the Carick and the forked reef of the head — and the people separated, and the three old net weavers straggled back to their home, the crew of the Peveril went off with the Fairbrothers to Lague. Great preparations were already afoot there, for Asher had sent on a message ahead of them, and the maids were bustling about, the fire was rekindled in the kitchen, and the kettle was singing merrily. And first there was a mouthful of grog, steaming hot, for every drenched and dripping seaman, with a taste of toast to sweeten it. Then there was getting all the men into a change of dry clothes in order that they might wait for a bite of supper, and until beds were shuffled about and shakedowns fetched out. And high was the sport and great the laughter at the queer shifts the house was put to that it might find clean rigging for so many, on even so short a cruise. When the six Fairbrothers had lent all the change they had of breeches and shirts, the maids had to fish out from their trunks a few petticoats and some gowns, for the sailors still unfurnished. But the full kit was furnished out at length, and when the ship’s company mustered down in the kitchen from the rooms above, all in their motley colors and queer mixture of garments, with their grizzled faces wiped dry, but their hair still wet and lank and glistening, no one could have guessed, from the loud laughter wherewith they looked each other over, that only an hour before Death itself had so nearly tricked them. Like noisy children let out of school they all were, now that they were snugly housed; for a seagoing man, however he may be kicked about on the sea, is not used to be downhearted on the land. And if two or three of the company continued to complain of their misfortunes, their growlings but lent zest to the merriment of the rest. So that they laughed loud when old Davy, cutting a most ridiculous figure in a linsey-wolsey petticoat and a linen bodice that would not meet over his hairy chest, began to grumble that he had followed the sea forty years and never been wrecked before, as if that were the best of all reasons why he should not come by such rough harm now, and a base advantage taken of him by Providence in his old age.
And louder still they laughed at the skipper himself when still sorely troubled by his evil luck, he wanted to know what all their thanking God was for, since his good ship lay a rotten hulk on a cruel reef; and if it was so very good of Providence to let them off that rock, it would have been better far not to let them on to it. And loudest of all they laughed, and laughed again, when an Irish sailor told them, with all his wealth of brogue, of a prayer that he had overheard old Davy pray while they hung helpless on the rock, thinking never to escape from it. “Oh, Lord, only save my life this once, and I’ll smuggle no more,” the Manxman had cried; “and it’s not for myself but ould Betty I ax it, for Thou knowest she’s ten years dead in Maughold churchyard with twenty rolls of good Scotch cloth in the grave atop of her. But I had nowhere else to put it, and, good Lord, only remember the last day, and save my life till I dig it up from off of her chest, for she was never a powerful woman.”
And the danger being over, neither Davy nor the skipper took it ill that the men should make sport of their groanings, for they laughed with the rest, and together they waked a most reckless uproar.
All this while, though Mrs. Fairbrother had not left her bedroom, the girls’ feet had been jigging about merrily over the white holy-stoned floor to get some supper spread, and Greeba, having tapped Jason, on the shoulder, had carried him off quietly to the door of the parlor, and pushed him in there while she ran to get a light, for the room was dark. It was also cool, with crocks of milk standing for cream, and basins of eggs and baskets of new-made cheese. And when she returned with the candle in one hand, shaded by the luminous fingers of the other, and its bright light on her comely face, she would have loaded him with every good thing the house contained — collared head, and beef, and binjeen and Manx jough, and the back of the day’s pudding. Nothing he would have, however, save one thing, and that made great sport between them: for it was an egg, and he ate it raw, shell included, crunching it like an apple. At that sight she made pretence to shudder. And then she laughed like a bell, saying he was a wild man indeed, and she had thought so when she first set eyes on him on the shore, and already she was more than half afraid of him.
Then they laughed again, she very slyly, he very bashfully, and while her bright eyes shone upon him she told him how like he was, now that she saw him in the light, to some one else she knew of. He asked her who that was, and she answered warily, with something between a smile and a blush, that it was one who had left the island that very night.
By this time the clatter of dishes mingled with the laughter and merry voices that came from the other side of the hall, and the two went back to the kitchen.
Asher Fairbrother, who had been dozing like a sheep dog in the ingle, was then rising to his feet, and saying, “And now for supper; and let it be country fashion, girls, at this early hour of the morning.”
Country fashion indeed it was, with the long oak table scrubbed white like a butcher’s board, and three pyramids of potatoes, boiled in their jackets, tossed out at its head and foot and middle, three huge blocks of salt, each with its wooden spoon, laid down at the same spaces, and a plate with a boiled herring and a basin of last night’s milk before every guest. And the seamen shambled into their places, any man anywhere, all growling or laughing, or both; and the maids flipped about very lightly, rueing nothing, amid so many fresh men’s faces, of the strange chance that had fetched them out of their beds for work at double tides.
And seeing the two coming back together from the parlor, the banter of the seamen took another turn, leaving old Davy for young Jason, who was reminded of the kiss he had earned on the beach, and asked if ever before a sailor lad had got the like from a lady without look or longing. Such was the flow of their banter until Greeba, being abashed, and too hard set to control the rich color that mounted to her cheeks, fled laughing from the room to hide her confusion.
But no rudeness was intended by the rude sea dogs, and no offence was taken; for in that first hour, after they had all been face to face with death, the barrier of manners stood for nothing to master or man or mistress or maid.
But when the rough jest seemed to have gone far enough, and Jason, who had laughed at first, had begun to hang his head — sitting just where Stephen Orry had sat when, long years before, he took refuge in that house from the four blue-jackets in pursuit of him — Old Davy Kerruish got up and pulled his grizzled forelock, and shouted to him above the tumult of the rest:
“Never mind the loblolly-boys, lad,” he cried, “it’s just jealous they are, being so long out of practice; and there’s one thing you can say, anyway, and that’s this — the first thing you did on setting foot in the Isle of Man was to save the life of a Manxman.”
“Then here’s to his right good health,” cried Asher Fairbrother, with his mouth in a basin of milk; and in that brave liquor, with three times three and the thud and thung of twenty hard fists on the table, the rough toast was called round.
And in the midst of it, when Greeba, having conquered her maiden shame, had crept back to the kitchen, and Mrs. Fairbrother, aroused at length by the lightsome hubbub, had come down to put an end to it, the door of the porch opened, and crazy old Chalse A’Killey stood upon the threshold, very pale, panting for breath, and with a ghastly light in his sunken eyes, and cried, “He’s dying. Where’s the young man that fetched him ashore? He’s crying out for him, and I’m to fetch him along with me straight away.”
Jason rose instantly. “I’ll go,” he said, and he snatched up a cap.
“And I’ll go with you,” said Greeba, and she caught up a shawl.
Not a word more was said, and at the next instant, before the others had recovered from their surprise, or the laughter and shouting were yet quite gone from their lips, the door had closed again and the three were gone.
