Kitabı oku: «The Bondman: A New Saga», sayfa 11

Next morning there came a great company of the poor, and stood in silence about the house. They knew that Adam had nothing to give, and they came for nothing; they on their part had nothing to offer, and they had nothing to say; but this was their way of showing sympathy with the good man in his dark hour.

The next morning after that old Adam said to Greeba,

"Come, girl, there is only one place in the island that we have a right to go to, and that's Lague. Let's away."

And towards Lague they set their faces, afoot, all but empty-handed, and with no one but crazy old Chalse A'Killey for company.

CHAPTER II.
How Greeba was Left with Jason

It was early summer, and the day was hot; there had been three weeks of drought, and the roads were dusty. Adam walked with a stout blackthorn stick, his flaccid figure sometimes swaying for poise and balance, and his snow-white hair rising gently in the soft breeze over his tender old face, now ploughed so deep with labor and sorrow. Chalse was driving his carrier's cart, whereon lay all that was left of Adam's belongings, save only what the good man carried in his purse. And seeing how heavy the road was to one of Adam's years, though his own were hardly fewer, poor old Chalse, recking nothing of dignity lost thereby, would have had him to mount the shafts and perch on the box behind the pony's tail. But Adam, thinking as little of pride, said No, that every herring should hang by its own gills, and the pony had its full day's work before it; moreover, that it was his right to walk at his own expense now, having ridden twenty years at the expense of the island. So he kept the good blackthorn moving, and Greeba stepped along nimbly by his side. And when the Castletown coach overtook and passed them on its way to Douglas, and some of the farming folk who rode on it leaned over saucily and hailed Adam by his Christian name, he showed no shame or rancor, until, when the coach was gone, he caught a glimpse of the hot color that had mounted to Greeba's cheeks. Then, without a word, he turned his mellow old face to his feet, and strode along a good half mile in silence.

And meantime, Chalse, thinking to lighten the burden of the way with cheerful talk, rattled along in his crazy screech on many subjects, but found that all came round, by some strange twist, to the one subject that might not be discussed. Thus, looking at his pony, he told of the donkey he had before it, the same that Michael Sunlocks rode long years ago; how he himself had fallen sick and could not to keep it, and so gave it without a penny to a neighbor for feeding it; and how when he got better he wanted to borrow it, but the neighbor, in base ingratitude and selfishness, would not lend it without pay.

"Faith, it's alwis lek that," said Chalse. "Give a man yer shirt, and ye must cut yer lucky or he'll be after axing ye for yer skin."

When they came by Douglas, Chalse was for skirting round by the Spring Valley through Braddon, but old Adam, seeing his drift, would not pretend to be innocent of it, and said that if there were dregs in his cup he was in the way of draining them without making too many wry faces about it. And as for the people of the town, if they thought no shame to stare at him he thought no shame to be stared at, yet that what was good enough for himself might not be so for one who had less deserved it, and Greeba could go with Chalse by Braddon, and they would meet again on Onchan Hill.

To this Greeba would not consent; and as it chanced there was little need, for when they got into Douglas the town was all astir with many carriages and great troops of people making for the quay, so that no one seemed so much as to see the little company of three that came covered with dust out of the country roads.

"Aw, bad cess, what jeel is this?" said Chalse; and before they had crossed the little market place by the harbor, where the bells of old St. Matthew's rang out a merry peal, they learned for certain the cause of the joyful commotion; for there they were all but run down by the swaying and surging crowds, that came shouting and cheering by the side of an open carriage, wherein sat a very old gentleman in the uniform of a soldier. It was, as Adam had already divined, the new Governor-General, Colonel Cornelius Smelt, newly arrived that day in the island as the first direct representative of the English crown in succession to the Lords of Man. And at that brave sight poor old Chalse, who jumbled in his distraught brain the idea of Adam's late position with that of his master the Duke of Athol, and saw nothing but that this gentleman, in his fine rigging, was come in Adam's place, and was even now on his way to Castletown to take possession of Government House, and that the bellowing mob that not a month before had doffed their caps before Adam's face, now shoved him off the pavement without seeing him, stamped and raved and shook his fist over the people, as if he would brain them.

They slept at Onchan that night, and next day they reached Kirk Maughold. And coming on the straggling old house at Lague, after so long an absence, Adam was visibly moved, saying he had seen many a humiliation since the days when he lived in it, and might the Lord make them profitable to his soul; but only let it please God to grant him peace and content and daily bread, and there should be no more going hence in the years that were left to him.

At that Greeba felt a tingling on both sides her heart, for her fears were many of the welcome that awaited them.

It was nigh upon noon, and the men were out in the fields; but Mrs. Fairbrother was at home, and she saw the three when they opened the gate and came down under the elms.

"Now, I thought as much," she said within herself, "and I warrant I know their errand."

Adam entered the house with what cheer of face he could command, being hard set to keep back his tears, and hailed his wife in a jovial tone, although his voice threatened to break, and sat himself down in his old seat by the chimney corner, with his blackthorn stick between his knees and his hands resting upon it. But Mrs. Fairbrother made no answer to his greeting, and only glanced from him to Greeba who tripped softly behind him, and from Greeba to Chalse, who came shambling in after them, vacantly scratching his uncovered head. Then, drawing herself up, and holding back her skirts, she said very coldly, while her wrinkled face twitched —

"And pray what ill wind blows you here?"

"An ill wind indeed, Ruth," Adam answered, "for it is the wind of adversity. You must have heard of our misfortune since the whole island knows of it. Well, it is not for me to complain, for God shapes our ways, and He knows what is best. But I am an old man now, Ruth, little able to look to myself, still less to another, and – "

While he spoke, Mrs. Fairbrother tapped her foot impatiently, and then broke in with —

"Cut it short, sir. What do you want?"

Adam lifted his eyes with a stupefied look, and answered very quietly, "I want to come home, Ruth."

"Home!" cried Mrs. Fairbrother, sharply. "And what home if you please?"

Adam sat agape for a moment, and then said, speaking as calmly as before, "What home, Ruth? Why, what home but this?"

"This, indeed! This is not your home," said Mrs. Fairbrother.

"Not my home!" said Adam, slowly, dropping back in his seat like one who is dumbfounded.

"Not my home! Did you say that this was not my home?" he said, suddenly bracing up. "Why, woman, I was born here; so was my father before me, and my father's father before him. Five generations of my people have lived and died here, and the very roof rafters over your head must know us."

"Hoity-toity!" cried Mrs. Fairbrother, "and if you had lived here much longer not a rafter of them all would have been left to shelter us. No, sir. I've kept the roof on this house, and it is mine."

"It is yours, indeed," said Adam slowly, "for I gave it you."

"You gave it me!" cried Mrs. Fairbrother. "Say I took it as my right when all that you had was slipping through your fingers like sand, as everything does that ever touches them."

At that hard word old Adam drew himself up with a great dignity of bearing, and said —

"There is one thing that has indeed slipped through my fingers like sand, and that is the fidelity of the woman who swore before God forty and odd years ago to love and honor me."

"Crinkleum-crankum!" cried Mrs. Fairbrother. "A pretty thing, truly, that I should toil and moil at my age to keep house and home together ready and waiting for you, when your zany doings have shut every other door against you. Misfortunes, indeed! A fine name for your mistakes!"

"I may have made mistakes, madam," said Adam; "but true it is, as the wise man has said, that he who has never made mistakes has never made anything."

"Tush!" said Mrs. Fairbrother.

"Ruth, do you refuse to take me in?" said Adam.

"This house is mine," said she; "mine by law and deed, as tight as wax can make it."

"Do you refuse to take me in?" said Adam again, rising to his feet.

"You have brought ruin on yourself by your shilly-shally and vain folly," said she; "and now you think to pat your nose and say your prayers by my fireside."

"Ruth," said Adam once more, "do you refuse to take me in?"

"Yes, and that I do," said she. "You would beggar me as you have beggared yourself, but that I warrant you never shall."

Then there was a grim silence for a moment. Old Adam gripped convulsively the staff he leaned on, and all but as loud as the ticking of the clock was the beating of his heart.

"God give me patience," he said. "Yes, I'll bear it meekly. Ruth," he said, huskily, "I'll not trouble you. Make yourself sure of that. While there's a horse-wallet to hang on my old shoulders, and a bit of barley bread to put in it, I'll rove the country round, but I'll never come on my knees to you and say, 'I am your husband, I gave you all you had, and you are rich and I'm a beggar, and I am old – give me for charity my bed and board.'"

But, unable to support any longer the strife for mastery that was tearing at his heart, he gave way to his wrath, and cried out in a loud voice, "Out on you, woman! Out on you! God forgive me the evil day I set eyes on you! God forgive me the damned day I took you to my breast to rend it."

While this had been going forward Greeba had stood silent at the back of her father's chair, with eyelashes quivering and the fingers of both hands clenched together. But now she stepped forward and said, "Forgive him, mother. Do not be angry with him. He will be sorry for what he has said: I'm sure he will. But only think, dear mother: he is in great, great trouble, and he is past work, and if this is not his home, then he is homeless."

And at the sound of that pleading voice Adam's wrath turned in part to tenderness, and he dropped back to the chair and began to weep.

"I am ashamed of my tears, child," he said; "but they are not shed for myself. Nor did I come here for my own sake, though your mother thinks I did. No, child, no; say no more. I'll repent me of nothing I have said to her – no, not one word. She is a hard, a cruel woman; but, thank heaven, I have my sons left to me yet. She is not flesh of my flesh, though one with me in wedlock; but they are, they will never see their father turned from the door."

At that instant three of the six Fairbrothers, Asher, Ross and Thurstan, came in from the stackyard, with the smell of the furze-rick upon them that they had been trimming for the cattle. And Adam, without waiting to explain, cried in the fervor of his emotion, "This is not your will, Asher?" Whereupon Asher, without any salutation, answered him, "I don't know what you mean, sir," and turned aside.

"He has damned your mother," said Mrs. Fairbrother, with her morning apron to her eyes, "and cursed the day he married her."

"But she is turning me out of the house," said Adam. "This house – my father's house."

"Ask her pardon, sir," Asher muttered, "and she will take you back."

"Her pardon! God in heaven!" Adam cried.

"You are an old man now, sir," said Thurstan.

"So I am; so I am," said Adam.

"And you are poor as well."

"That's true, Thurstan; that's true, though your brother forgets it."

"So you should not hold your head too high."

"What! Are you on her side, also? Asher, Thurstan, Ross, you are my sons – would you see me turned out of the house?"

The three men hung their heads. "What mother says he must agree to," muttered Asher.

"But I gave you all I had," said Adam. "If I am old I am your father, and if I am poor you know best who made me so."

"We are poor, too, sir; we have nothing, and we do not forget who is to blame for it," Thurstan growled.

"You gave everything away from us," grumbled Ross; "and, because your bargain is a rue bargain, you want us now to stand aback of you."

And Stean, and Jacob, and John coming in at that moment, Jacob said, very slyly, with something like a sneer —

"Ah, yes, and who took the side of a stranger against his own children? What of your good Michael Sunlocks now, sir? Is he longing for you? Or have you never had the scribe of a line from him since he turned his back on you, four years ago?"

Then Greeba's eyes flashed with anger. "For shame," she cried, "for shame! Oh, you mean, pitiful men, to bait and badger him like this."

Jacob threw up his head and laughed, and Mrs. Fairbrother said, "Chut, girl, you're waxing apace with your big words, considering you're a chit that has wasted her days in London and hasn't learned to muck a byre yet."

Adam did not hear her. He sat like a man who is stunned by a heavy blow. "Not for myself," he mumbled, "no, not for myself, though they all think it." Then he turned to his sons and said, "You think I came to beg for bed and board for myself, but you are wrong. I came to demand it for the girl. I may have no claim upon you, but she has, for she is one with you all and can ask for her own. She has no home with her father now, for it seems that he has none for himself; but her home is here, and here I mean to leave her."

"Not so fast, sir," said John. "All she can ever claim is what may one day be hers when we ourselves come into anything. Meantime, like her brothers, she has nothing but what she works for."

"Works for, you wagtail?" cried Adam; "she is a woman! Do you hear? – a woman?"

"Woman or man, where's the difference here?" said Gentleman John, and he snapped his fingers.

"Where's the difference, you jackanapes? Do you ask me where's the difference here? Here? In grace, in charity, in unselfishness, in faith in the good; in fidelity to the true, in filial love and duty! There's the difference, you jackanapes."

"You are too old to quarrel with, sir; I will spare you," said Gentleman John.

"Spare me, you whipper-snapper! You will spare me! But oh, let me have patience! If I have cursed the day I first saw my wife let me not also curse the hour when she first bore me children and my heart was glad. Asher, you are my firstborn, and heaven knows what you were to me. You will not stand by and listen to this. She is your sister, my son. Think of it – your only sister."

Asher twisted about, where he sat by the window nook, pretending to doze, and said, "The girl is nothing to me. She is nothing to any of us. She has been with you all the days of her life except such as you made her to spend with strangers. She is no sister of ours."

Then Adam turned to Ross, "And do you say the same?" he asked.

"What can she do here?" said Ross. "Nothing. This is no place for your great ladies. We work, here, every man and woman of us, from daylight to dark, in the fields and the dairy. Best send her back to her fine friends in London."

"Ay," said Jacob, glancing up with a brazen smile into Greeba's face, "or marry her straight off – that is the shortest way. I heard a little bird tell of someone who might have her. Don't look astonished, Miss, for I make no doubt you know who it is. He is away on the mountains now, but he'll be home before long."

Greeba's eyes glistened, but not a muscle of her countenance changed. Only she clutched at the back of her father's chair and clung to it. And Adam, struggling hard to master the emotion that made his whole body to sway and tremble in his seat, said slowly, "If she is not your sister, at least she is your mother's daughter, and a mother knows what that means." Then turning to Mrs. Fairbrother, who still stood apart with her housewife's apron to her eyes, he said, "Ruth, the child is your daughter, and by that deed you speak of she is entitled to her share of all that is here – "

"Yes," said Mrs. Fairbrother, sharply, "but only when I am done with it."

"Even so," said Adam, "would you see the child want before that, or drive her into any marriage, no matter what?"

"I will take her," said Mrs. Fairbrother deliberately, "on one condition."

"What is it, Ruth?" said Adam; "name it, that I may grant it."

"That you shall give up all control of her, and that she shall give up all thought of you."

"What?"

"That you shall never again expect to see her or hear from her, or hold commerce of any kind with her."

"But why? Why?"

"Because I may have certain plans for her future welfare that you might try to spoil."

"Do they concern Michael Sunlocks?"

"No, indeed," said Mrs. Fairbrother, with a toss of the head.

"Then they concern young Jason, the Icelander," said Adam.

"If so, it is my concernment," said Mrs. Fairbrother.

"And that is your condition?"

"Yes."

"And you ask me to part from her forever? Think of it, she is my only daughter. She has been the light of my eyes. You have never loved her as I have loved her. You know it is the truth. And you ask me to see her no more, and never more to hear from her. Now, God punish you for this, you cold-hearted woman!"

"Take care, sir. Fewer words, or mayhap I will recall my offer. If you are wise you will be calm for the girl's sake."

"You are right," he said, with his head down. "It is not for me to take the bread out of my child's mouth. She shall choose for herself."

Then he twisted about to where Greeba stood in silence behind his chair. "Greeba," he said, with a world of longing in his eyes, "my darling, you see how it is. I am old and very poor, and heaven pity my blind folly, I have no home to offer you, for I have none to shelter my own head. Don't fear for me, for I have no fear for myself. I will be looked to in the few days that remain to me, and, come what may, the sorry race of my foolish life will soon be over. But you have made no mistakes that merit my misfortunes. So choose, my child, choose. It is poverty with me or plenty with your mother. Choose, my child, choose; and let it be quickly, let it be quickly, for my old heart is bursting."

Then the brave girl drew herself proudly up, her brilliant eyes aflame, and her whole figure erect and quivering.

"Choose?" she cried, in a piercing voice; "there is no choice. I will go with my father, and follow him over the world, though we have no covering but the skies above us."

And then Adam leapt from his chair to his feet, and the infirmity of his years seemed gone in an instant, and his wet face shone with the radiance of a great joy. "Do you hear that, you people?" he cried. "There's grace, and charity, and unselfishness, and love left in the world still. Thank heaven, I have not yet to curse the day her body brought forth children. Come, Greeba, we will go our ways, and God's protection will go with us. 'I have been young and now am old, yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread.'"

He strode across to the door, then stopped and looked back to where his sons stood together with the looks of whipped dogs.

"And you, you unnatural sons," he cried, "I cast you out of my mind. I give you up to your laziness and drunkenness and vain pleasures. I am going to one who is not flesh of my flesh, and yet he is my son indeed."

Again he made for the door, and stopped on the threshold, and faced about towards his wife. "As for you, woman, your time will come. Remember that! Remember that!"

Greeba laid one hand softly on his shoulder and said, "Come, father, come," but again he looked back at his sons and said, "Farewell, all of you! Farewell! You will see me no more. May a day like this that has come to your father never, never come to you."

And then all his brave bearing, his grand strength broke down in a moment, and as the girl laid hold of his arm, lest he should reel and fall, he stumbled out at the threshold, sobbing beneath his breath, "Sunlocks, my boy; Sunlocks, I am coming to you – I am coming to you."

Chalse A'Killey followed them out, muttering in an under-breath some deep imprecations that no one heeded. "Strange," said he, "the near I was to crucifying the Lord afresh and swearing a mortal swear, only I remembered my catechism and the good John Wesley."

At the gate to the road they met Jason, who was coming down from Barrule with birds at his belt. With bewildered looks Jason stood and looked at them as they came up, a sorry spectacle, in the brightness of the midday sun. Old Adam himself strode heavily along, with his face turned down and his white hair falling over his cheeks. By his side Greeba walked bearing herself as proudly as she might, with her head thrown back and her wet eyes trying hard to smile. A pace or two behind came Chalse with his pony and cart grunting hoarsely in his husky throat. Not a word of greeting did they give to Jason, and he asked for no explanation, for he saw it all after a moment: they being now homeless had drifted back to their old home and had just been turned away from it. And not a word of pity did he on his part dare to offer them, but in the true sympathy of silence he stepped up to Adam and gave him his strong arm to lean upon, and then turned himself about to go their way.

They took the road to Ramsey, and little was said by any of them throughout the long two miles of the journey, save only by Chalse, who never ceased to mutter dark sayings to himself, whereof the chief were praises to God for delivering them without loss of life or limb or hand or even out of a den of lions, for, thanks be to the Lord! He had drawn their teeth.

Now though the world is hard enough on a good man in the hour of his trouble, there are ever more tender hearts to compassionate his distresses than bitter ones to triumph over his adversity, and when Adam Fairbrother came to Ramsey many a door was thrown open to him by such as were mindful of his former state and found nothing in his fall to merit their resentment. No hospitality would he accept, however, but took up his abode with Greeba in a little lodging in the market place, with its face to the cross and its back towards the sea. And being safely housed there, he thanked Jason at the door for the help of his strong arm, and bade him come again at ten o'clock that night, if so be that he was in the way of doing a last service for a poor soul who might never again have it in his power to repay. "I'll come back at ten," said Jason, simply, and so he left them for the present.

And when he was gone Adam said to Greeba as he turned indoors, "A fine lad that, and as simple as a child, but woe to the man who deceives him. Ay, or to the woman either. But you'll never do it, girl? Eh? Never? Never?"

"Why, father, what can you mean? Are we not going away together?" said Greeba.

"True, child, true," said Adam; and so without further answer to her question, twice repeated, he passed with her into the house.

But Adam had his meaning as well as his reason for hiding it. Through the silent walk from Lague he had revolved their position and come to a fixed resolution concerning it. In the heat of his emotion it had lifted up his heart that Greeba had chosen poverty with him before plenty with her mother and her brothers, but when his passion had cooled he rebuked himself for permitting her to do so. What right had he to drag her through the slough of his own necessities! He was for going away, not knowing the fate that was before him, but on what plea made to his conscience dare he take her with him? He was old, his life was behind him, and, save herself, he had no ties. What did it matter to him how his struggle should end? But she was young, she was beautiful, she might form new friendships, the world was before her, the world might yet be at her feet, and life, so sweet and so sad, and yet so good a thing withal, was ready and waiting for her.

Once he thought of Michael Sunlocks, and that the arms that would be open to himself in that distant land would not be closed to Greeba. And once he thought of Jason, and that to leave her behind was to help the schemes that would bring them together. But put it as he would, no farther could he get than this, that she must stay, and he must go away alone.

Yet, knowing the strength of her purpose, he concealed his intention, and his poor bewildered old head went about its work of preparation very artfully. It was Friday, and still not far past noon, when they reached their lodging by the cross. After a hasty meal he set out into the town, leaving Greeba to rest, for she had walked far since early morning. At the quay he inquired the date of a vessel that called there sometimes in summer on its passage from Ireland to Iceland, and to his surprise he found that she was even then in the harbor, and would go out with the first tide of the next day, which would flow at one o'clock in the morning.

Thereupon he engaged his berth, and paid for his passage. It cost six pounds, besides a daily charge of four shillings for rations. The trip was calculated to last one month with fair wind and weather, such as then promised. Adam counted the cost, and saw that with all present debts discharged, and future ones considered, he might have somewhat between six and seven pounds in his pocket when he set foot in Reykjavik. Being satisfied with this prospect, he went to the High Bailiff for his license to leave the island.

Greeba had heard nothing of this, and as soon as night fell in she went up to bed at her father's entreaty. Her room was at the back of the house and looked out over the sea, and there she saw the young moon rise over the waters as she undressed and laid down to sleep.

Prompt to his hour Jason came, and then Adam told him all.

"I am going away," he said, "far away, indeed into your own country. I go to-night, though my daughter, who is asleep, knows nothing of my intention. Will you do me a service?"

"Try me," said Jason.

And then Adam asked him to stay in Ramsey over night, that he might be there when Greeba came down in the morning, to break the news to her that her father had gone, and to take her back with him to Lague.

"They will not say no to her, seeing her father is not with her; and the time is coming when she will hold her right to a share of all they have, and none of them dare withhold it."

Jason who had been up to Lague, had heard of all that had passed there, and played his own part too, though he said nothing of that. He was now visibly agitated. His calm strength had left him. His eyes were afire, his face twitched, his hands trembled, and he was plainly struggling to say what his quivering lips refuse to utter.

"Is there no other way?" he asked. "Must she go back to Lague? Is there no help for it?"

"None," said Adam; "for she is penniless, God forgive me, and beggars may not be choosers."

At that word Jason was unable to support any longer the wild laboring of his heart.

"Yes, yes, but there is a way," he cried, "for there is one to whom she is rich enough though he is poor himself, for he would give his life's blood if so be that he could buy her. Many a day he has seen all and stood aside and been silent, because afraid to speak, but he must speak now, or never."

Hearing this, Adam's face looked troubled, and he answered —

"I will not misdoubt you, my good lad, or question whom you mean."

And Jason's tongue being loosed at last, the hot words came from him like a flood.

"I have been an idle fellow, sir, I know that; good for nothing in the world, any more than the beasts of the field, and maybe it's because I've had nobody but myself to work for; but give me the right to stand beside her and you shall see what I can do, for no brother shall return her cold looks for her sweetness, and never again shall she go back where she will only be despised."

"You are a brave lad, Jason," said Adam, as best he could for the tears that choked him; "and though I have long had other thoughts concerning her, yet could I trust her to your love and keeping and go my ways with content. But no, no, my lad, it is not for me to choose for her; and neither is for her to choose now."

Pacified by that answer Jason gave his promise freely, faithfully to do what Adam had asked of him. And the night being now well worn towards midnight, with the first bell of the vessel rung, and old Chalse fussing about in busy preparation, the time had come for Adam to part from Greeba. To bid her farewell was impossible, and to go away without doing so was well-nigh as hard. All he could do was to look upon her in her sleep and whisper his farewell in his heart. So he entered on tiptoe the room where she lay. Softly the moon shone through the window from across the white sea, and fell upon the bed. Pausing at the door he listened for her breathing, and at last he heard it, for the night was very still, and only by the sea's gentle plash on the beach was the silence broken. Treading softly he approached the bedside, and there she lay, and the quiet moonlight lay over her – the dear, dear girl, so brave and happy-hearted. Her lips seemed to smile; perhaps she was dreaming. He must take his last look now. Yet no, he must kiss her first. He reached across and lightly touched her pure forehead with his lips. Then she moved and moaned in her sleep, and then her peaceful breathing came again. "Now, peace be with her," Adam murmured, "and the good hand to guard her of the good Father of all."