 Part 3, Chapter 1 of the Manxman. Philip was vanquished, and he knew it. But he was not daunted. He was not distressed. To have resisted the self-abandonment of Kate's love would have been monstrous. Therefore, he had done no wrong, and there was nothing to be ashamed of. But when he reached Balur, he did not dash into Aunty Nan's room, according to his wound, though a light was burning there, and he could hear the plop and click of thread and needle. He crept upstairs to his own, and sat down to write a letter. It was the first of his love letters. I shall count the days, the hours, and the minutes until we meet again, my darling, and I shall be constantly asking what time it is, and seeing we must be so much apart, let us contrive a means of being together nevertheless. Listen, I whisper the secret in your ear. Tomorrow night, and every night, eat your supper at eight o'clock exactly. I will do the same, and so we shall be supping in each other's company, my little wife, though twenty miles divide us. If anybody asks me to supper, I will refuse in order that I may sup with you. I am promised to a friend, I'll say, and then I'll sit down in my rooms alone, but you will be with me. Tingling with delight, he wrote this letter to Kate, though less than an hour parted from her, and went out to post it. He was going upstairs again, steadily on tiptoe, his head half aside and his face over his shoulder, when Auntie Nan's voice came from the blue room, Philip. He returned with a sheepish look, and a sense never felt before of being naked, so to speak. But Auntie Nan did not look at him. She was working a lamb on a sampler, and she reached over the frame to take something out of a drawer and handed to him. It was a medallion of a young child, a boy with long, fair curls like a little girl's, and a face like sunshine. Was it Father Auntie? Yes, a French painter who came ashore with furlough painted it for grandfather. Philip laid it on the table. He was more than ever sure that Auntie Nan had heard something. Such were her tender ways of warning him. He could not be vexed. I'm sleepy tonight, Auntie, and you look tired too. You've been waiting up for me again. Now you really must not, besides it limits one's freedom. That's nothing, Philip. You said you would come home after calling on the poor deemster, and so he's in a bad way, Auntie. Drink, delirium, such a wreck. Well, good night. Did you read the letters, dear? Oh, yes, Father's letters. Yes, I read them. Good night. Aren't they beautiful? Haven't they the very breath of ambition and enthusiasm? But poor Father, how soon the brightness melted away. He never repined, though. Oh, no, never. Indeed he used to laugh and joke at our dreams and our castles in the air. You must do it all yourself, Nanny. You shall have all the cakes and ale. Yes, when he was a dying man he would joke like that, but sometimes he would grow serious, and then he would say, Give little Philip some for all. He'll deserve it more than me. Oh, God, he would say, Let me think to myself when I'm there. You've missed the good things of life, but your son has got them. You are here, but he is on the heights. Lie still, thou poor aspiring heart. Lie still in your grave and rest. Philip felt like a bird struggling in the meshes of a net. My father was a poet, Auntie, trying to be a man of the world. That was the real mischief in his life, if you think of it. Auntie Nan looked up with her needle of poise above the sampler and said in a nervous voice, The real mischief of his father's life, Philip, was love. What they call love. But love is not that. Love is peace and virtue and right living, and that is only madness and frenzy. And when people wake up from it, they wake up as from a nightmare. Men talk of it as a holy thing. It is unholy. Books are written in praise of it. I would have such books burned. When anybody falls to it, he is like a blind man who has lost his guide, toffering straight to the precipice. Women fall to it too. Yes, good women, as well as good men. I have seen them tempted. Philip was certain of it now. Someone had been prying upon him at Sulby. He was angry, and his anger spent itself on Auntie Nan in a torrent of words. You are wrong, Auntie Nan. Quite wrong. Love is the one lovely thing in life. It is beauty. It is poetry. Call it passion, if you will. What would the world be like without it? A place where every human heart would be an island standing alone. A place without children, without joy, without merriment, without laughter. No, no. Heaven has given us love, and we are wrong when we try to put it away. We cannot put it away. And when we make the attempt, we are punished for our pride and arrogance. It ought to be enough for us to let heaven decide whether we are to be great men or little men, and to decide for ourselves whether we are to be good men and happy men. And the greatest happiness of life is love. Heaven would have to work a miracle to enable us to live without it. But heaven does not work such a miracle, because the greatest miracle of heaven is love itself. The needle-hand of Aunty Nan was trembling above her sampler, and her lips were twitching. You are a young man yet, Philip, she faltered, but I am an old lady down here, and I have seen the fruits of the intoxication you call passion. Oh, have I not, have I not? It wrecks lives, ruins prospects, breaks up homes, sets father against son, and brother against brother. Philip would give her no chance. He was tramping across the room, and he burst out with You are wrong again, Aunty. You are always wrong in these matters, because you are always thinking from the particular to the general. You are always thinking of my father. What you have been calling my father's fall was really his fate. He deserved it. If he had been fit for the high destiny he aspired to, if he had been fit to be a judge, he would not have fallen. That he did fall is proof enough that he was not fit. God did not intend it. God did not intend it. My father's aspirations were not the call of a stern vocation. They were mere poetic ambition. If he had ever by great ill fortune lived to be made deemster, he would have found himself out, and the island would have found him out, and you yourself would have found him out, and all the world would have been undeceived. As a poet he might have been a great man, but as a deemster he must have been a mockery, a hypocrite, an imposter, and a sham. Auntie Nan rose to her feet with a look of fright on her sweet old face, and something dropped with a clank onto the floor. Oh, Philip, Philip, if I thought you could ever repeat the error. But Philip gave her no time to finish. Tossing his disordered hair from his forehead, he swung out of the room. Being alone he began to collect himself. Was it in sober fact he who had spoken like that, of his father too, to Auntie Nan as well? He saw how it was. He had been speaking of his father, but he had been thinking of himself. He had been struggling to justify himself, to reconcile, strengthen, and fortify himself. But in doing so he had been breaking an idol, a lifelong idol, his own idol, and Auntie Nan's. He stumbled downstairs in a rush of remorse, and burst again into the room crying in a broken voice. Auntie, Auntie! But the room was empty, the lamp was turned down, the sampler was pushed aside. Something crunched under his foot, and he stooped and picked it up. It was the medallion, and it was cracked across. The accident terrified him. His skin seemed to creep. He felt as if he had trodden on his father's face. Putting the broken picture into his pocket, he turned about like a guilty man, and crept silently to bed in the darkness. But the morning brought him solace for the pains of the night. It brought him a letter from Kate. The medallion is over at long, long last, and I am allowed to be alone with my thoughts. They sang, Qiri Foush Nakti, after you left, and the king can only love his wife, and I can do the same, and I can do the same. But there is really nothing to tell you, for nothing happened of the slightest consequence. Good night, I am going to bed after I have posted this letter at the bridge. Two hours hence you will appear to me in sleep, unless I lie that long awake to think of you. I generally do. Goodbye, my dear lord and master. You will let me know what you think best to be done. Your difficulties alarm me terribly. You see, dear, we too are about to do something so much out of the common. Good night, I lift my head that you may give me another kiss on the eyes, and here are two for yours. Then there were empty brackets, which Kate had put her lips to, expecting Philip to do the same. End of Part 3, Chapter 1, Recording by Tony Ashworth Please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Tony Ashworth The Manxman by Sir Hall Cain Part 3, Chapter 2 Philip was going into his chambers in Douglas that morning, when he came upon a messenger from Government House in stately intercourse with his servant. His Excellency begged him to step up to Onkin immediately, and to remain for lunch. The Governor's carriage was at the door, and Philip got into it. He was not excited. He remembered his agitation at the Governor's former message and smiled. On leaving his own rooms, he had not forgotten to order supper for eight o'clock precisely. He found the Governor polite and expansive as usual. He was sitting in a room hung round with ponderous portraits of former Governors, most of them in frills and ruffles, and one vast picture of King George. You will have heard, he said, that our northern deemster is dead. Is he so, said Philip? I saw him at one o'clock yesterday. He died at two, said the Governor. Poor man, poor man, said Philip. That was all, not a tremble of the eyelid, not a quiver of the lip. You are aware that the office is a crown appointment, said the Governor. Applications are made, you know, to the Home Office, but it is probable that my advice may be asked by the Secretary in his selection. I may perhaps be of use to a candidate. Philip gave no sign, and the Governor shifted his leg and continued with a smile. Certainly that appears to be the impression of your brother advocates, Mr. Christian. They are about me already, like wasps at a glue pot. I will not question, but you'll soon be one of them. Philip made a gesture of protestation, and the Governor waved his hand and smiled again. Oh, I shall not blame you, young man, or ambitious. It is natural that they should wish to advance themselves in life. In your case too, if I may say so, there is the further spur of a desire to recover the position your family once held, and lately lost through the mistake or misfortune of your father. Philip bowed gravely, but said nothing. That, no doubt, said the Governor, would be a fact in your favour. The great fact against you would be that you are still so young. Let me see, is it eight and twenty? Twenty-six, said Philip. No more? Only six and twenty. And then successful as your career has been thus far, perhaps I should say distinguished or even brilliant, you are still unsettled in life. Philip asked if his excellence he meant that he was still unmarried. And if I do, the Governor replied, with pretended severity. And if I do, don't smile too broadly, young man. You ought to know by this time that the personal equation counts for something in this old-fashioned island of yours. Now, the late Deemster was an example which it would be perilous to repeat. If it were repeated, I know who would hear of the blunder every day of his life, and it wouldn't be the Home Secretary either. Deemster Millray was called upon to punish the crimes of drink, and he was himself a drunkard, to try the offences of sensuality, and he was himself a sensualist. Philip could not help it. He gave a little crack of laughter. To be sure, said the Governor hastily, you are in no danger of his excesses, but you will not be a safe candidate to recommend until you have placed yourself to all appearances out of the reach of them. Beware of these Christians, said the great Darby to his son. And pardon me if I revive the warning to a Christian himself. The colour came strong into Philip's face. Even at that moment, he felt angry at so coarse a version of his father's fault. You mean, said he, that we are apt to marry unwisely. I do that, said the Governor. There's no telling, said Philip, with a faint crack of his fingers, and the Governor frowned a little. The pockmarks seemed to spread. Of course, all this is outside my duty, Mr. Christian. I needn't tell you that, but I feel an interest in you, and I've done you some services already, though naturally a young man will think he has done everything for himself. Ah, he said, rising from his seat at the sound of a gong. Luncheon is ready. Let us join the ladies. Then with one hand on Philip's shoulder, familiarly, only a word more, Mr. Christian. Send in your application immediately, and take the advice of an old fiddler. Marry as soon afterwards as may be. But with your prospects, it would be a sin not to walk carefully. If she's English, so much the better. But if she's Manx, take care. Philip lunched with the Governor's wife, who told him she remembered his grandfather, also with his unmarried daughter, who said she had heard him speak for the fisherman at Peel. An official at home the last of the summer was to be held in the garden that afternoon, and Philip was invited to remain. He did so, and thereby witnessed the assaults of the wasps at the Glupod. They buzzed about the Governor, they buzzed about his wife, they buzzed about his dog, and about a tame deer, which took grapes from the hands of the guests. An elderly gentleman sitting alone in a carriage drove up to the lawn. It was Peter Christian Balawain, looking feebler, whiter, and more splay-footed than before. Philip stepped up to his uncle and offered his arm to a light-buy. But the Balawain brushed it aside and pushed through to the Governor, to whom he talked incessantly for some minutes of his son Ross, saying he had sent for him and would like to present him to his Excellency. If Philip lacked enjoyment of the scene, if his face lacked heart and happiness, it was not the fault of his host. Will you not take ladies so and so to have tea, the Governor would say? And presently Philip found himself in a circle of official wifedom, whose husbands had been made knights by the Queen, and themselves made ladies by, God knows whom. The talk was of the late Deemster. Such a life, it's a mercy he lasted so long. A pity you mean, my dear, not to be hard on him, either. Poor thing, he ought to have married. Such a man wants a wife to look after him. Don't you think so, Mr. Christian? Why, said a white-haired Deem, have you never heard of his great romance? Ah, tell us of that. Who was the lady? The lady? There was a pause. The white-haired Deem coughed, smiled, closed her little ferrit eyes, dropped her voice and said with mock gravity, the lady was the blacksmith's daughter, dearest, and then there was a merry trill of laughter. Philip felt sick, bowed to his hosts and left. As he was going off, his uncle intercepted him, holding out both hands. How's this, Philip? You never come to Balloway now? I see. Oh, I see. Too busy with the women to remember an old man. They're all talking of you, putting the comathor on them, eh? I know. I know. Don't tell me. End of Part 3, Chapter 2, Recording by Tony Ashworth. Part 3, Chapter 3 of The Manxman. This is a LibriVox Recording. All LibriVox recordings were in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Tony Ashworth. The Manxman by Sir Hall Cain. Part 3, Chapter 3. Philip's way home lay through the town. But he made a circuit of the country, across Onkin. So heart-sick was he, so utterly choked with bitter feelings. He felt as if all the angels and devils together must be making a mock at him. The thing he had worked for through five heavy years, the end he had aimed at, the goal he had fought for, was his already, his for the stretching out of his hand. Yet now that it was his, he could not have it. Oh, the mockery of his fate, oh, the irony of his life, it was shrieking, it was frantic. Then his bolder spirit seemed to say, What is all this childish fuming about? Fortune comes to you with both hands full. Be bold, and you may have both the wish of your soul and the desire of your heart, both the deemstership and Kate. It was impossible to believe that. If he married Kate, the Governor would not recommend him as deemster. Had he not admitted that he stood in some fear of the public opinion of the island? And was it not conceivable that, besides the unselfish interest which the Governor had shown in him, there was even a personal one that would operate more powerfully than fear of the old-fashioned man's conventions to prevent any recommendation of the husband of the Lord. At one moment a vague memory rose before Philip as he crossed the fields of the lunch at Government House, of the Governor's wife and daughter, of their courtesy and boundless graciousness. At the next moment he had drawn up sharply with pangs of self-contempt, hating himself, loathing himself, swearing at himself for a mean-soul ingrate, as he kicked up the grass and the turf beneath it. But the idea had taken root. He could not help it. The Governor's interest went for nothing in his reckoning. What a fool you are, Philip. Something seemed to whisper out of the darkest corner of his conscience. Take the deemstership first and marricade afterwards. But it was impossible to think of that either. Say it could be done by any arts of cunning or duplicity. What then? Then there were the people who were to blame What then? Then there were the high walls of custom and prejudice to surmount. Philip remembered the garden party and saw that they could never be surmounted. The deemster who slapped the conventions in the face would suffer for it. He would be tabooed to half the life of the island, in public and official, in private or recluse. An icy picture rose before his mind's eye of the woman who would be his wife in her relations with the ladies he had just left. She might be their superior in education, certainly in all true manners, and in natural grace and beauty, in sweetness and charm, their mistress beyond a dream of comparison. But they would never forget that she was the daughter of a country innkeeper, and every little cobble in the rickety pyramid, even from the daughter of the innkeeper in the town, would look down on her as from a throne. He could see them leaving their cards at his door and driving hurriedly off. They must do that much. It was the bitter pill which the deemsters' doings made them swallow. Then he could see his wife sitting alone, a miserable woman, despised, envied, isolated, shut off from her own class by her marriage with the deemster, and from his class by the deemster's marriage with her. Again he could see himself too powerful to offend, too dangerous to ignore, going out on his duties without cheer and returning to his wife without company. Finally he remembered his father and his mother, and he could not help but picture himself sitting at home with Kate five years after their marriage, when the first happiness of each other's society had faded, had staled, had turned to the wretchedness of starvation in its state of siege, or perhaps going out for walks with her, just themselves, always themselves only. They two together, this evening, last evening, and tomorrow evening, through the streets crowded by visitors, down the harbour where the fishermen congregate, across the bridge and over the head between sea and sky, people barring to them respectfully, rigidly, freezingly, people nudging and whispering and looking their way. Oh God, what end could come of such an abject life but that, beginning by being unhappy, they should descend to being bad as well. What a fuss you are making of things said the voice again, but more loudly. This hubbub only means that you can't have your cake and eat it. Very well, take Kate and let the deemstership go to perdition. There was not much comfort in that council, for it made no reckoning with the certainty that if marriage with Kate would prevent him from being deemster, it would prevent him from being anything in the Isle of Man. As it had happened with his father, so it would happen with him, there would be no standing ground in the Isle for the man who had deliberately put himself outside the pail. Don't worry me with silly efforts to draw a line so straight. If you can't have Kate and the deemstership together, and if you can't have Kate without the deemstership, there is only one thing left, the deemstership without Kate. You must take the office and forego the girl. It is your duty, your necessity. This was how Philip put it to himself at length, and the daylight had gone by that time, and he was walking in the dark. But the voice which had been pleading on his side now protested on hers. Don't pray to duty and necessity. You mean self-love and self-interest. Man, be honest. Because this woman is an obstacle in your career, you would sacrifice her. It is boundless, pitiless selfishness. Suppose you abandon her. Dare you think of her without shame? She loves you, she trusts you, and she has given you proof of her love and trust. Hold your tongue. Don't dare to whisper that nobody knows it but you and her. That you will be silent, that she will have no temptation to speak. She loves you, she has given you all. God bless her. Affectionate pity swept down the selfish man in him. As the lights of the town appeared on his path, he was saying to himself boldly, Since either way there is trouble, I'll do as I said last night. I'll leave heaven to decide whether I'm to be a great man or little man, and decide for myself whether I'm to be a true man or a happy man. I'll take my heart in my hand and go right forward. In this temper he returned to his chambers. The rooms fronted to Athol Street, but backed on to the churchyard of St. George's. They were quiet and not overlooked. His lamp was lit. The servant was laying the cloth. Lay covers for two, Jemmy, said Philip. Then he began to hum something. Presently, in feeling for his keys, his fingers touched an unfamiliar substance in his pocket. He remembered what it was. It was the cracked medallion of his father. He could not bear to look at it. Unlocking a chest, he buried it at the bottom under a pile of winter clothing. This recalled a possession yet more painful. And going to a desk, he drew out the packet of his father's letters and proceeded to hide them away with the medallion. As he did so, his hand trembled. His limbs shook. He felt giddy. And he thought the voice that had tormented him with conflicting taunts was ringing in his ears again. Bury him deep. Bury your father out of all sight and all remembrance. Bury his love of you, his hopes of you, his expectations and dreams of you. Bury and forget him forever. Philip hesitated a moment and then banged down the lid of the chest and re-locked it as his servant returned to the room. The man was a solemn dignified and reticent person who had been groomed to the late Bishop. His gravity he had acquired from his horses, his dignity from his master, but his reticence he had created for himself, being a thing beyond nature and creature or man. His proper name was Cotier. He had always been known as Gemma Lord. Company not arrived, sir, he said. Wait or serve? What is the time, said Philip. Struck eight, but clocked two minutes soon. Serve the supper at once, said Philip. When the dishes had been brought in and the man dismissed, Philip, taking his place at the table, drew from his buttonhole the flower which he had picked out of his water bowl at lunch. And first putting it to his lips, he tossed it onto the empty place before the chair, which had been drawn up opposite. Then he sat down to eat. He ate little and, do what he would, he could not keep his mind from wandering. He thought of his aunt and how hurt she had been the previous night, of his uncle and how he had snubbed and then slaved over him. Of the governor and how strange the interest he had shown in him. And finally he thought of Pete and how lately he was dead and how soon forgotten. In the midst of these memories, all sad and some bitter, suddenly he remembered again that he was supping with Kate. Then he struggled to be bright and even a little gay. He knew that she would be taking her supper at Salby at that moment, thinking of him and making believe that he was with her. So he tried to think that she was with him, sitting in the chair opposite, looking across the table between the white cloth and the blue lampshade, out of her beaming eyes with her rings of dark hair dancing on her forehead and her right mouth twitching merrily. Then the air of the room seemed to be filled with a sweet presence. He could have fancied there was a perfume of lace and dainty things. Sweetheart. He laughed. He hardly knew if it was himself that had spoken. It was dear, delicious fooling. But his eyes fell on the chest wherein he had buried the letters and the medallion, and his mind wandered again. He thought of his father, of his grandfather, of his lost inheritance, and how nearly he had reclaimed the better part of it. And then once more of Pete, crying aloud at last in the coil of his trouble, oh, if Peter had only lived. His voice startled and his words horrified him. To wipe out both in the first moment of recovered consciousness, he filled his glass to the brim and lifted it up, rising at the same time, looking across the table and saying in a soft whisper, your health, darling, your health. The bell rang from the street door, and he stood listening with the wine glass in his hand. When he knew anything more, a voice at his elbow was saying out of a palpitating gloom. The gentleman can't come, seemingly. He has sent a telegram. It was Gemma Lord holding a telegram in his hand. Philip tore open the envelope and read, Coming home by Ramsay Boat tomorrow. Well and hearty, tell, Kirrie, Pete. End of Part 3, Chapter 3, Recording by Tony Ashworth. Part 3, Chapter 4 of The Manxman. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings were in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Tony Ashworth. The Manxman by Sir Hall Cain. Part 3, Chapter 4. Somewhere in the dead and vacant dawn, Philip went to bed, worn out by a night-long perambulation of the dark streets. He slept a heavy sleep of four deep hours with oppressive dreams of common things, swelling to enormous size about him. When Gemma Lord took the tea to his master's bedroom in the morning, the tray was almost banged out of his hands by the clashing back of the door after he had pushed it open with his knee. The window was half up and a cold sea breeze was blowing into the room. Yet the great and hearth showed that a fire had been kindled in the night and his master was still sleeping. Gemma sat down his tray, lifted a decanter that stood on the table, held it to the light, snorted like an old horse, nodded to himself knowingly and closed the window. Philip awoke with the noise and looked around in a bewildered way. He was feeling vaguely that something had happened when the man said, The horse will be round soon, sir. What horse said Philip? The horse you ride, sir, said Gemma, and with an indulgent smile he added, The one I ordered from Shimmons when I posted the letter. What letter? The letter you gave me to post before I went to bed. All was jumbled and confused in Philip's mind. He was obliged to make an effort to remember. Just then the news boys went shouting down the street beyond the church yard. Special addition, death of the deemster. Then everything came back. He had written to Kate asking her to meet him at Port Moor at two o'clock that day. It was then and in that lonesome place he had decided to break the news to her. He must tell all. He had determined upon his course. Without appetite he ate his breakfast. As he did so he heard voices from a stable yard in the street. He lifted his head and looked out mechanically. A four-wheel dog cart was coming down the archway between a metalsome young horse with silver-mounted harness. The man driving it was a gorgeous person in a light melt and overcoat. One of his spattered feet was on the break and he had a big cigar between his teeth. It was Ross Christian. The last time Philip had seen the man he had fought him for the honour of Kate. It was like whips and scorpions to think of that now. Ashamed, abased, degraded in his own eyes, he turned away his head. End of Part 3 Chapter 4 Recording by Tony Ashworth Part 3 Chapter 5 of The Manxman This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings were in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Tony Ashworth The Manxman by Sir Hall Cain Part 3 Chapter 5 In the middle of the night following the mellia Kate turning in bed kissed her hand because it had held the hand of Philip. When she awoke in the morning she felt a great happiness. Opening her eyes and half-raising herself in bed she looked around. There were the pink curtains hanging like a tent above her. There were the sprays of the thatched roof with the cracking whitewash snipping down on the counterpane. There were the press and the wash hand table, the sheepskin on the floor and the sun coming through the orchard window. But everything was transfigured, everything beautiful, everything mysterious. She was like one who had gone to sleep on the sea with only the unattainable horizon around about and awakened in harbour in a strange land that was warm and lovely and full of sunshine. She closed her eyes again so that nothing might disturb the contemplation of the mystery. She folded her round arms as a pillow behind her head, her limbs dropped back of their own weight, and her mouth broke into a happy smile. Oh, miracle of miracles! The whole world was changed! She heard the clatter of patterns in the room below. It was Nancy churning in the dairy. She heard shouts from beyond the orchard. It was her father stacking in the haggard. She heard her mother talking in the bar and the mill-wheel swishing in the pond. It seemed almost wonderful that the machinery of ordinary life could be working away the same as ever. Could she be the same herself? She reached over for a hand-glass to look at her face. As she took it off the table, it slipped from the tips of her fingers, and falling face downwards it broke. She had a momentary pang of that accident, as at a bad omen, but just then Nancy came up with a letter. It was the letter which Philip had written of Ballour. When she was alone again, she read it. Then she put it in her bosom. It seemed to be haunted by the odour of the gorse, the odour of the glen, of the tolton, of Philip, and of all delights. A faint ghost of shame came to frighten her. Had she sinned against her sex? Was it disgraceful that she had wooed and not waited to be won? With all his love of her, would Philip be ashamed of her also? Her face grew hot. She knew that she was blushing, and she covered up her head as if her lover were there to see. Such fears did not last long. Her joy was too bold to be afraid of tangible things. So overwhelming was her happiness that her only fear was lest she might awake at some moment and find that she was asleep now, and everything had been a dream. That was Friday, and towards noon word came from Kirk Michael that the deemster had died on the afternoon of the day before. Then they ought to put Philip Christian in his place, she said promptly. I'm sure no one deserves it better. They had been talking in low tones in the kitchen with their backs to her, but faced about with looks of astonishment. Sakes alive, Kiri cried Nancy. Is it yourself it was? What were you saying a week ago? Well, do you expect a girl to be saying the one thing always laughed Kate? Oh, no, said Caesar. A woman's opinions isn't usually as stiff as the tale of a fighting Tomcat. They're more coming and going of a rule. Next day Saturday she received Philip's second letter, the letter written at Douglas after the supper and the arrival of Pete's telegram. It was written crosswise in a hasty hand on a half sheet of note paper and was like a post-script without signature or superscription. Most urgent. Must see you immediately. Meet me at Port Moor at two o'clock tomorrow. We can talk there without interruption. Be brave, my dear. There are serious matters to discuss and arrange. The message was curt and even cold, but it brought her no disquiet. Marriage. That was the only vision that conjured up. The death of the deemster had hastened things. That was the meaning of the urgency. Port Moor was near to Balor. That was why she had to go so far. They would have to face gossip, perhaps backbiting, perhaps even abuse. That was the reason she had to be brave. Why and how the deemster's death should affect her marriage with Philip was a matter she did not puzzle out. She had vague memories of girls marrying in delightful haste and sailing away with their husbands and being gone before you had time to think they were to go. But this new fact of her life was only a part of the great mystery and was not to be explained by everyday ideas and occurrences. Cake ran up to dress and came down like a bud bursting into flower. She had dressed more carefully than ever. Philip had great expectations. He must not be disappointed. Making the excuse of shopping, she was setting off towards Ramsay when her father shouted from the stable that he was for driving the same way. The mare was harnessed to the gig and they got up together. Caesar had made inquiries and calculations. He had learned that the Johannesburg from Cape Town arrived in Liverpool the day before and he concluded that Pete's effects would come by the peverell, the weekly steamer to Ramsay, on Saturday morning. The peverell left Liverpool at eight. She would be due at three. Caesar meant to be on the key at two. It's my duty as a parent, Kate, said he, what more natural but there's something for yourself. It's my duty as a pastor too for those manx ones going that's in danger of the devil of covetousness and it's doing the Lord's work to put them out of the reach of temptation. You may exhort with them till you're black in the face, but it's throwing good money in the mud. Just chuck. No ring at all. No way responsive. Kate was silent and Caesar added familiarly. Of course it's my right too for when a man's birth is that way there's no airship by blood and possession is nine points of the law. That's so Kate. You needn't be looking so hard. It's truth enough girl. I've had Advocate's opinion. Kate had looked but had not listened. The matter of her father's talk was too trivial. Its interest was too remote. As they drove she kept glancing seaward and asking what time it was. Or time enough yet woman said Caesar. No need to be uneasy at all. She'll not be round the head for an hour anyway. Will you come along with me to the key then? No? Well better not baby. At the door of a draper's she got down from the gig and told her father not to wait for her on going home. Caesar moistened his forefinger and held it in the air a moment. Then don't be late said he. There's weather coming. A few minutes afterwards she was walking rapidly up Belua. Passing Belua house she found herself treading softly. It was like holy ground. She did not look across. She gave no sign. There was only a tremor of the eyelids, a quiver of the mouth, and a tightening of the hand that held the purse. As with head down she passed on. Going by the water trough she saw the bullet head of Black Tom looking seaward over the hedge through a telescope encased in torn and faded cloth. Though the man was repugnant to her she saluted him cheerfully. Fine day Mr. Quilliam. It was doing a fine day mum, but the bees is coming home said Tom. She gloured at her as at a scout of the enemy, but she did not mind that. She was very happy. The sun was still shining. On reaching the top of the brow she began to skip and run where the road descends by folio. Thus with a light heart and a light step, thinking ill of no one, in love with all the world she went hurrying to her doom. The sea below lay very calm and blue. Nothing was to be seen on the water, but a line of black smoke from the fumble of a steamship which had not yet risen above the horizon. End of Part 3 Chapter 5, Recording by Tony Ashworth Recording by Tony Ashworth The Manxman by Sir Hall Kane Part 3 Chapter 6 Philip put up his horse at the hibernian, a mile farther on the high road, and the tongue of the landlady, Mistress Looney, went like a mill race while he ate his dinner. She had known three generations of his family and was full of stories of his grandfather, of his father and of himself in his childhood. Philip facetiae, too, about his looks, which were reasonable promising, and about the girls of Douglas who were neither good nor middlin. She was also full of sage council, advising marriage with a warm girl having nice things at her, nice lands and pigs and things, as a ready way to square the bobbery of thirty years ago at Ballowayne. Philip left his plate half full and rose from the table to go down to Portmore. But, boy, Veen, you've destroyed nothing, cried the landlady, and then coaxingly, as if he had been a child. You'll be eating bits for me now. Come, come. No more at all. Oh, it's failing, you are, Mistress Philip. Going for a walk, is it? Take a topcoat, then, for the clover is closing. He took the road that Pete had haunted as a boy on returning home from the school in the days when Kate lived at Cornay, going through the network of paths by the mill, and over the brow by Balajora. The new miller was pulling down the thatch cottage in which Kate had been born to put up a slate house. They had built a porch for shelter to the chapel and carved the figure of a slaughtered lamb on a stone in the gable. Another lamb, a living lamb, was being killed by the butcher of Balajora as Philip went by the shambles. The helpless creature, with his inverted head swung downwards from the block, looked at him with its piteous eyes, and gave forth that distressful cry, which is the last wild appeal of the stricken animal when it sees death near, and has ceased to fight for life. The air was quiet, and the sea was calm, but across the channel a leaden sky seemed to hover over the English mountains, though they were still light and apparently in sunshine. As Philip reached Portmore, a cart was coming out of it with a load of sea rack for the land, and a lobster fisher on the beach was shipping his gear for sea. Quiet days, said Philip in passing. I'm not much like in the look of it, though, said the fisherman. Mortal thick surf coming up for the wind that's in. But he slipped his boat, pulled up sail, and rode away. Philip looked at his watch, and then walked down the beach. Coming to a cave, he entered it. The sea rack was banked up in the darkness behind, and between two stones at the mouth there were the remains of a recent fire. Suddenly he remembered the cave. It was the cave of the carous do-men. He could hear the voice of Pete in its rumbling depths. He could hear and see himself. Shall we save the women, Pete? We always do. Oh yes, the women and the boys. The tenderness of that memory was too much for Philip. He came out of the cave and walked back over the shore. She will come by the church, he thought, and he climbed the cliffs to look out. A line of fir trees grew there, a comb of little misshapen, gul-like things, stunted by the winds that swept over the seas in winter. In a fork of one of these, a bird's nest of last year was still hanging, but it was now empty, songless, joyless, and dead. She's here, he told himself, and he drew his breath noisily. A white figure had turned the road by the sundial and was coming on with the step of a greyhound. The black clouds above the English mountains were healing down on the land. There was a storm on the other coast, though the sky over the island was still fine. The steamship had risen above the horizon and was heading towards the bay. End of Part 3, Chapter 6 Recording by Tony Ashworth Part 3, Chapter 7 of The Manxman This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Tony Ashworth The Manxman by Sir Hall Cain Part 3, Chapter 7 She met him on the hill's slope with a cry of joy and kissed him. It came into his mind to draw away, but he could not, and he kissed her back. Then she linked her arm in his, and they turned down the beach. I'm glad you've come, he began. Did you ever dream I wouldn't, she said? Her face was a smile, her voice was an eager whisper. I have something to say to you, Kate. It is something serious. Is it so, she said, so very serious? She was laughing and blushing together. Didn't she know what he was going to say? Didn't she guess what this serious something must be? To prolong the delicious suspense before hearing it, she pretended to be absorbed in the things about her. She looked aside at the sea and up at the banks and down at the little dubs of salt water as she skipped across them, crying out at sight of the sea holly, be an enemy, and the sea-mouth shining like fire, but still holding to Philip's arm and bounding and throbbing on it. You must be quiet, dear, and listen, he said. Oh, I'll be good, so very good, she said. But look, only look at the white horses out yonder, far out beyond the steamer. Davy's putting on the coppers for the pass, isn't he? She caught the grave expression of Philip's face and drew herself up with pretended severity, saying, Be quiet, Katie, behave yourself. Philip wants to talk to you seriously, very seriously. Then leaning forward with head aside to look up into his face, she said, Well, sir, why don't you begin? Perhaps you think I'll cry out. I won't, I promise you I won't. But she grew uneasy at the subtle gravity of his face and the joy gradually died off her own. When Philip spoke, his voice was like a crack-decker of itself. You remember what you said, Kate, when I brought you that last letter from Kimberley, that if next morning you found it was a mistake? Is it a mistake, she asked? Be calm, Kate. I'm quite calm, dear. I remember I said it would kill me, but I was very foolish. I should not say so now. Is Peter alive? She spoke without a tremor, and he answered in a husky whisper, Yes. Then, at a breaking voice, he said, We were very foolish, Kate. Jumping so hastily to a conclusion was very foolish. It was worse than foolish, it was wicked. I half doubted the letter at the time, but God forgive me, I wanted to believe it. And so, I am glad Peter's living, she said quietly. He was aghast at her calmness. The irregular lines in his face showed the disordered state of his soul, but she walked by his side without the creva of an eyelid, or a tinge of color more than usual. Had she understood? Look, he said, and he drew Pete's telegram from his pocket and gave it to her. She opened it easily, and he watched her while she read it, prepared for a cry, and ready to put his arms about her if she fell. But there was not a movement save the motion of her fingers, not a sound except the crinkling of the thin paper. He turned his head away. The sun was shining, there was a steely light on the furs, and here and there a white breaker was rising like a seabird out of the blue surface of the sea. Well, she said. Kate, you astonish me, said Philip. This comes on us like a thunder cloud, and you seem not to realize it. She put her arms about his neck, and the paper rustled on his shoulder. My darling, she said, do you love me still? You know I love you, but… Then there is no thunder cloud in heaven for me now, she said. The simple grandeur of the girl's love shamed him. Its trust, its confidence, its indifference to all the evil chants of life. If only he loved her still, this had been beyond him. But he disengaged her arms and said, We must not live in a fool's paradise, Kate. You promised yourself to Pete. But Philip, she said, that was when I was a child. It was only a half-promise then, and I didn't know what I was doing. I didn't know what love was. All that came later, dearest. Much later. You know when. To Pete it is the same thing, Kate, said Philip. He is coming home to claim you. She stopped him by getting in front of him and saying with face down, smoothing his sleeve as she spoke. You are a man, Philip, and you cannot understand. How can you, and how can I tell you, when a girl is not a woman, but only a child? She is a different person. She can't love anybody then. Not really. Not to say love, and the promises she makes can't count. It was not I that promised myself to Pete, if I did promise. It was my little sister, the little sister that was me long, long ago. But he's now gone, put to sleep inside me somewhere. Is that very foolish, darling? But think of Pete, said Philip. Think of him going away for love of you, living five years abroad, toiling, slaving, saving, encountering privations, perhaps perils, and all for you, all for love of you. Then think of him coming home with his heart full of you, buoyed up with the hope of you, thirsting, starving, and yearning for you, and finding you lost to him, dead to him, worse than dead, it will kill him, Kate. She was unmoved by the picture. I'm very sorry, but I did not love him, she said quietly. I am sorry, what else can a girl be when she does not love a young man? He left me to take care of you too, and you see, you see by the telegram, he's coming home with faith in my loyalty. How can I tell him that I have broken my trust? How can I meet him and explain? I know, Philip, say we heard he was dead, and no, it would be too wretched. It's only three weeks since the letter came, and it would not be true, Kate, it would revolt me. She lifted her eyes in a fond look of shame-faced love, and said again, I know then, lay the blame on me, Philip. What do I care? Say it was all my fault, and I made you love me. I shan't care for anybody's talk, and it's true, isn't it? Partly true, eh? If I talk to Pete of temptation, I should despise myself, said Philip, and then she threw her head up and said proudly, Very well, tell the truth itself, the simple truth, Philip. Say we tried to be faithful and loyal, and all that, and could not, because we loved each other, and there was no help for it. If I tell him the truth, I shall die of shame, said Philip. Oh, there is no way out of this miserable tangle. Whether I cover myself with deceit, or strip myself of evasion, I shall stain my soul forever. I shall become a baseman, and year by year sink lower and lower in the mire of lies and deceit. She listened with her eyes fixed on his quivering face, and her eyelids fluttered, and her fond looks began to be afraid. Say that we married, he continued, We should never forget that you had broken your promise, and I, my trust. That memory would haunt us as long as we lived. We should never know one moment's happiness, or one moment's peace. Pete would be a broken-hearted man, perhaps a wreck, perhaps, who knows, dead of his own hand. He would be the ghost between us always. And do you think I should be afraid of that, she said? Indeed, no. If you were with me, Philip, and love me still, I should not care for all the spirits of heaven itself. Her face was as pale as death now, but her great eyes were shining. Our love would fail us, Kate, said Philip. The sense of our guilt would kill it. How could we go on loving each other with a thing like that about us all day and all night, sitting at our table, listening to our talk, standing by our bed? Oh, merciful God! The terror of his vision mastered him, and he covered his face with both hands. She drew them down again, and held them in a tight lock in her fingers. But the stony light of his eyes was more fearful to look upon, and she said in a troubled voice, Do you mean, Philip, that we could not marry now? He did not answer, and she repeated the question, looking up into his face like a criminal waiting for his sentence. Her head bent forward and her mouth open. We cannot, he muttered. God help us, we dare not, he said. And then he tried to show her again how their marriage was impossible, now that Pete had come without treason and shame and misery. But his words frayed off into silence. He caught the look of her eyes, and it was like the piteous look of the lamb under the hands of the butcher. Is that what you came to tell me, she asked? His reply died in his throat. She divine rather than herded. Her doom had fallen on her, but she did not cry out. She did not yet realize in all its fullness what had happened. It was like a bullet wound in battle, first a sense of air, almost of relief, then a pang, and then overwhelming agony. They had been walking again, but she slid in front of him as she had done before. Her arms crept up his breast with a caressing touch, and linked themselves behind his neck. This is only a jest, dearest, she said, some test of my love, perhaps. You wish to make sure of me, quite, quite sure, now that Pete is alive and coming home. But you see, I want only one to love me, only one, dear. Come now, confess. Don't be afraid to say you have been playing with me. I shan't be angry with you. Come, speak to me. He could not utter a word, and she let her arms fall from his neck. And they walked on side by side, both staring out to sea. The English mountains were black by this time. Her tempest was raging on the other shore, though the air on this side was as soft as human breath. Presently she stopped. Her feet scraped the gravel, and she exclaimed in a husky tone. I know what it is. It is not, Pete. I'm in your way. That's it. You can't get on with me about you. I'm not fit for you. The distance between us is too great. He struggled to deny it, but he could not. It was part of the truth. He knew too well how near to being the whole truth it was. Pete had come at the last moment to cover up his conscience, but Kate was stripping it naked and showing him the skeleton. It's all very well for you, he she cried. But where am I? Why didn't you leave me alone? Why did you encourage me? Yes indeed, encourage me. Didn't you say though a woman couldn't raise herself in life, a man could lift her up if he only loved her? And didn't you tell me there was neither below nor above where there was true liking, and that if a woman belonged to someone, and someone belonged to her, it was God's sign that they were equal, and everything else was nothing. Pride was nothing, and position was nothing, and the whole world was nothing. But now I know different. The world is between us. It always has been between us, and you can never belong to me. You will go on and rise up, and I will be left behind. Then she broke into frightful laughter. Oh, I've been a fool how I dreamt of being happy. I knew I was only a poor ignorant thing, but I saw myself lifted up by the one I loved, and now I am to be left alone. Oh, it is awful. Why did you deceive me? Yes, deceive me. Isn't that deceiving me? You deceived me when you led me to think that you loved me more than all the world. You don't. It is the world itself you love, and Pete is only your excuse. As she spoke, she clutched at his arms, his hands, his breast, and at her own throat, as if something was strangling her. He did not answer her reproaches, for he knew well what they were. They were the bitter cry of her great love, her great misery, and her great jealousy of the world, the merciless and mysterious power that was luring him away. After a while, his silence touched her, and she came up to him, full of remorse and said, No, no, Philip, you have nothing to reproach yourself with. You did not deceive me at all. I deceived myself. It was my own fault. I led you on. I know that. And yet I've been saying these cruel things. You'll forgive me, though, will you not? A girl can't help it sometimes, Philip. Are you crying? You're not crying, are you? Kiss me, Philip, and forgive me. You can do that, can't you? She asked like a child, with her face up and her lips apart. He was about to yield, and was reaching forward to touch her forehead, when suddenly the child became the woman, and she leapt upon his breast and held him fervently, her blood surging, her bosom exalting, her eyes flaming, and her passionate voice crying, Philip, you are mine. No, I will not release you. I don't care about your plans. You shall give them up. I don't care about your trust. You shall break it. I don't care about Pete coming. Let him come. The world can do without you. I cannot. You are mine, Philip, and I am yours, and nobody else's, and never will be. You must come back to me, soon or later, if you go away. I know it. I feel it. It's in my heart. But I'll never let you go. I can't. I can't. Haven't I a right to you? Yes, I have a right. Don't you remember? Can you ever forget? My husband? The last word came muffled from his breast, where she had buried her head in the convulsions of her trembling at the moment when her modesty went down in the fierce battle with a higher pain. At the plea which seemed to give her the right to cling the closer made the man to draw apart. It was the old deep tragedy of human love, the ancient inequality in the bond of man and woman. What she had thought her conquest had been her vanquishment. He could not help it. Her last word had killed everything. Oh, God, he groaned. That is the worst of all. Philip, she cried, what do you mean? I mean that neither can I marry you, nor can you marry Pete. You would carry to him your love of me, and bit by bit he would find it out, and it would kill him. It would kill you too, for you have called me your husband, and you could never, never, never forget it. I don't want to marry Pete, she said. If I'm not to marry you, I don't want to marry anyone. But do you mean that I must not marry at all, that I never can, now that the word failed her? And his answer came thick and indistinct. Yes. And you, Philip, what about yourself? As there is no other man for you, Kate, he said, so there is no other woman for me. We must go through the world alone. Is this my punishment? It is the punishment of both, Kate, the punishment of both alike. Kate stopped her breathing, her clenched hands slackened away from his neck, and she stepped back from him, shuddering with remorse, and despair and shame. She saw herself now for the first time a fallen woman. Never before had her sin touched her soul. It was at that moment she fell. They had come up to the cave by this time, and she sat on the stone at the mouth of it, in a great outburst of weeping. It tore his heart to hear her. The voice of her weeping was like the distressed cry of the slaughtered lamb. He had to wrestle with himself, not to take her in his arms and comfort her. The fit of tears spent itself at length, and after a time she drew a great breath and was quiet. Then she lifted her face, and the last gleam of the autumn sun smote her colourless lips and swollen eyes. When she spoke again, it was like one speaking in her sleep, or under the spell of somebody who had magnetised her. It is wrong of me to think so much of myself, as if that were everything. I ought to feel sorry for you too. You must be driven to it, or you could never be so cool. With his face to the sea, he mumbled something about Pete, and she caught up the name and said, Yes, and Pete too, as you think it would be wrong to Pete, I will not hold to you. Oh, it will be wrong to me as well, but I will not give you the pain to turning a deaf ear to my troubles any more. She was struggling with a pitiless hope that perhaps she might regain him after all. If I gave him up, she thought, he will love me for it. And then with a sad ring in her voice she said, You will go on and be a great man now, for you'll not have me to hold you back. For Pete he's safe, say no more of that, he said, but she paid no heed. I used to think it a wonderful thing to be loved by a great man. I don't now, it is terrible. If I could only have you to myself, if you could only be nothing to anybody else, you would be everything to me, and what should I care then? Between torture and love, he had almost broken down at that, but he gripped his breast and turned half a side, for his eyes were streaming. She came up to him and touched with the tips of her fingers the hand that hung by his side, and said in a voice like a child's, Chansey, this is the end of everything, and when we part now we are to meet no more. Not the same way at all, not as we have met. You will be like anybody else to me, and I will be like anybody else to you. Miss Cregine, that will be my name, and you will be Mr Christian. When you see me you'll say to yourself, Yes poor thing, long ago when she was a girl, I made her love me. Nobody ever loved me like that. And fancy, when you pass me in the street, you will not even look my way. You won't, will you? No, no, it will be better not. Goodbye. A simple tenderness almost stifled him. He had to hold his underlip with his teeth to keep back the cry that was bursting from his tongue. At last he could bear it no longer, and he broke out. Would to God we had never loved each other. Would to God we had never met. But she answered with the same childish sweetness. Don't say that, Philip. We have had some happy hours together. I would rather be parted from you like this, though it is so hard, so cruel, than never to have met you at all. Isn't it something for me to think of, that the truest, cleverest, noblest man in all the world has loved me? Goodbye. Goodbye. His heart bled, his heart cried, but he uttered no sound. They were side by side. She let his hand slip from the tips of her fingers, and drew silently away. At three paces apart she paused, but he gave no sign. She climbed the low brow of the hill slowly, very slowly, trying to command her throat, which was fluttering, and looking back through her tears as she went. Philip heard the shingles slip under her feet while she toiled up the cliff, and when she reached the top the soft thud on the turf seemed to beat on his heart. She stood there a moment against the sky, waiting for a sound from the shore, a cry, a word, the lifting of a hand, a sob, a sigh, her own name, Kate, and she was ready to fly back even then, wounded and humiliated as she was, a poor torn bird that had been struggling in the line. But no, he was silent and motionless, and she disappeared behind the hill. He saw her go, and all the light of heaven went with her. End of Part 3 Chapter 7 Part 3 Chapter 8 of The Manxman This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Tony Ashworth The Manxman by Sir Hall Cain Part 3 Chapter 8 It was so far back home so much farther than it had been to come. The course is short and easy going out to sea when the tide is with you, and the water is smooth and the sun is shining, but long and hard coming back to harbour when the waves have risen and the sky is low and the wind is on your bow. So far, so very far, she thought everybody looked at her and knew her for what she was, a broken, forsaken, fallen woman, and she was so tired too, she wondered if her limbs would carry her. When Philip was left alone, the sky seemed to be lying on his shoulders. The English mountains were grey and ghostly now, and the storm which had spent itself on the other coast seemed to hang over the island. There were breakers where the long dead sea had been, and the petrol outside was scutting close to the white curves and uttering its dismal note. So heavy and confused had the storm and wreck of the last hour left him, that he did not at first observe by the backward tail of smoke that the steamer had passed round the head, and that the cart he had met at the mouth of the port had come back empty to the cave for another load of sea-rack. The lobster fisher too had beached his boat nearby and were shouting through the hollow air wherein every noise seemed to echo with a sepulchral quake. The block was going whistling at the mast head. We'll have a squall, I was thinking, so in I came. That night Philip dreamt a dream. He was sitting on a dais with a wooden canopy above him, the English coat of arms behind, and a great book in front. His hands shook as he turned the leaves. He felt his leg hang heavily. People bowed low to him and dropped their voices in his presence. He was the deemster, and he was old. A young woman stood in the dock, dripping water from her hair, and she had covered her face with her hands. In the witness-box a young man was standing, and his head was down. The man had delivered the woman to dishonour. She had attempted her life in her shame and her despair. And looking on the man, the deemster thought he spoke in a stern voice, saying, Witness, I'm compelled to punish her, but Ode to Heaven, that I could punish you in her place. What have you to say for yourself? I have nothing to say for myself, the young man answered, and he lifted his head, and the old deemster saw his face. Then Philip awoke with a smothered scream, for the young man's face had been his own. End of Part 3, Chapter 8. Part 3, Chapter 9 of the Manxman. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings were in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Tony Ashworth. The Manxman by Sir Hall Kane. Part 3, Chapter 9. When Caesar got to the key, he looked about with watchful eyes, as if fearing he might find somebody there before him. The coast was clear, and he gave a grunt of relief. After fixing the horsecloth, and settling the mare in a nosebag, he began to walk up and down the four part of the harbour, still keeping an eager look out. As time went on, he grew comfortable, exchanged salutations with the harbour master, and even whistled a little to while away the time. Quiet day, Mr Croyle. Quiet enough yet, Mr Craigine, but what's it saying? The greater the calm, the nearer the south wind. By the time that Caesar from the end of the pier saw the smoke of the steamer coming round Kirk Morgold head, he was in a spiritual, almost a mournful mood. He was feeling how melancholy was the task of going to meet the few possessions, the clothes and such like, which were all that remained of a dear friend departed. It was the duty of somebody though, and Caesar drew a long breath of resignation. The steamer came up to the key, and there was much bustle and confusion. Caesar waited with one hand on the mare's neck until the worst of it was over. Then he went aboard and said in a solemn voice to the sailor at the foot of the gangway. Anything hear the property of Mr Peter Quilliam? That's his luggage, said the sailor, pointing to a leather trunk of moderate size among similar trunks at the mouth of the hatchway. Hmm, said Caesar, eyeing at sideways, and thinking how small it was. Then reflecting that perhaps valuable papers were all it was thought worthwhile to send home, he added cheerfully, I'll take it with me. Somewhat to Caesar's surprise, the sailor raised no difficulties, but just as he was regarding the trunk with that faith, which is the substance of things hoped for, a big ugly hand laid hold of it and began to rock it about like a pebble. It was Black Tom smoking with perspiration. A easy man, easy, said Caesar with lofty dignity. I've the gig on the key. And I've a stiff cart on the market, said Black Tom. I'm wanting no assistance, said Caesar. You needn't trouble yourself. Don't mention it, Caesar, said Black Tom, and he turned the trunk on end and bent his back to lift it. But Caesar put a heavy hand on top and said, God bless me, man, but I'm sorry for thee. Mammon hath entered into thy heart, Tom. He hath just popped out of thine, then, said Black Tom, swirling the trunk on one of its corners. But Caesar held on and said, I don't know in the world why you should let the devil of covetousness get the better of you. I don't mean to, let go the chist, said Black Tom, and in another minute he had it on his shoulder. Now I believe in my heart, said Caesar. I would be forgiven a little violence, and he took the trunk by both hands to bring it down again. Let go of the chist, or I'll strike thee into the harbour-bulled Black Tom under his load. The Philistines be upon thee, Samson cried Caesar, and with that there was a struggle. In the midst of the uproar, while the men were shouting into each other's faces, and the trunk was rocking between them shoulder high, a sunburned man with a thick beard and a formidable voice, a stalwart fellow in a pilot jacket and wide-brimmed hat, came hurrying up the cabin stairs, and a dog came running behind him. A moment later he had parted the two men, and the trunk was lying at his feet. Black Tom fell back a step, lifted his straw hat, scratched his bald crown, and muttered in a voice of awe, holy sailor. Caesar's face was livid, and his eyes went up toward his forehead. Lord, have mercy upon me, he mumbled. Have mercy on my soul, oh Lord. Don't be afraid, said the stranger. I'm a living man, and not a ghost. The man himself, said Black Tom. Peter Quilliam, alive and hearty, said Caesar. I am, said Pete, and now what's the bobbery between the pair of you? Superintending the beaching of my trunk, eh? But having recovered from his terror the idea that Pete was a spirit, Caesar began to take him to task for being a living man. How's this, said he? Answer me, young man, I've preached your funeral. You'll have to do it again, Mr. Cragheen, for I'm not gone yet, said Pete. No, but worth ten dead men still, said Black Tom. And my goodness, boy, the smart and stout you're looking anyway. Been thatching a bit on the chin, eh? Foreign parts has made a man of you, Peter. The straight you're like the family, too. You'll be coming up to the trough with me, the old home, you know. I'll be whipping the chist ashore in a jiffy, only Caesar's that eager to help. It's wonderful. No, you'll not then? Pete was shaking his head as he went up the gangway, and seeing this, Caesar said severely, lay the gentleman alone, Mr. Quilliam. He knows his own business best. So do you, Mr. Collecting Box, said Black Tom. But your head's as empty as a mollug, and as full of wind as well. It's a regular old human mollug, you are, anyway, floating other people's nets and taking all that's coming to them. They were ashore by this time. One of the key porters was putting the trunk into the gig, and Caesar was removing the horsecloth and the nosebag. Get up, Mr. Peter, and don't listen to hymns, said Caesar. If my industry and integrity have been blessed with increase under providence, lay providence out of it, you grasping old Lebanese, Zachariah, amen, bold Black Tom. You've been flying in the face of providence all your life, Tom, said Caesar, taking his seat beside Pete. You haven't, though, you miser, said Black Tom. You'd sell your soul for sixpence, and you'd raffle your ugly old body if you could get anybody to take tickets. Go home, Thomas, said Caesar, twiddling the reins. Go home and try for the future to be a better man. But that was too much for Black Tom. Better man, is it? Come down on the key and up with your fists, and I'll show you which of us is the better man. A moment later, Caesar and Pete were rattling over the cobbles of the marketplace with the dog racing behind. Pete was full of questions. And how's yourself, Mr. Quaggine? I'm in, sir, I'm in, sir, praise the Lord, and granny. Like myself, sir, not getting a day all younger, but caring little for spiritual things, though. Going west is she, poor old angel. There ought to be a good piece of daylight at her yet, for all. And, and Nancy Jo? A happy sinner still, said Caesar. I suppose, sir, you'd be making good money out yonder now. We were hearing the like, anyway. Money, said Pete. Well, yes. Enough to keep off the devil and the coroner. But how's, how's there now for life, eh? said Caesar. Yes, for life. But that's nothing, said Pete. How's— Wonderful, cried Caesar. Five years, too. Boy, Veen, the light was nearly took out of my eyes when I saw you. But Kate, how's Kate? How's the girl herself, said Pete nervously. Smart on common, said Caesar. God bless her, cried Pete, with a shout that was heard across the street. We'll pick her up at Crellins, it's like, said Caesar. What? Crellins round the corner? Crollin' the drapers? Whoa, let me down. The mayor's tired, Father, and Pete was over the wheel at a bound. He came out of the shop, saying Kate had left word that her father was not to wait for her. She would perhaps be home before him. Amid a crowd of the mobbed children of the streets, to whom he showered coppers to be scrambled for, Pete got up again to Caesar's side, and they set off for Solby. The wind had risen suddenly, and was hooting down the narrow streets coming up from the harbour. And Philip? How's Philip, shouted Pete? Mr. Christian? Well and hearty and doing wonders, sir. I knew it, cried Pete, with a resounding laugh. Going like a flood, and sweeping everything before him, said Caesar. The rising day with him, is it? said Pete. I always said he'd be the first man in the island, and he's not going to dissave me, neither. The young man's been over putting a sight on us times and times. He was up at my melio only a week come Wednesday, said Caesar. Man alive, cried Pete. Him and me are same as brothers. And it wasn't true what they were writing in the letter, sir, that your black boys left you for dead. They did that bad luck to them, said Pete, but I was thinking it no sin to disappoint them, though. Well, well, lying began with the world, and with the world it will end, said Caesar. As they passed Ballowane, Pete shouted into Caesar's ear, above the wind that was roaring in the trees, and scattering the ripening leaves in clouds. And how's Ross? That way, Strel. Oh, tearing away, tearing away, said Caesar. Floating on the top of the tide, is he? shouted Pete. Maybe so, but the devil is fishing where Yonder fellow's swimming, answered Caesar. And the old man, the Ballowane, still above the sod, pulled Pete behind his hand. Yes, but failing, failing, failing, shouted Caesar. The world's getting too heavy for the man. Dead's here, and dead's there, and dead's everywhere. No much water in the harbour then, eh? cried Pete. No, but down on the rocks already, if it's only myself that knows it, shouted Caesar. When they had turned the Solby Bridge, and come inside of the Manx Ferry, Pete's excitement grew wild, and he leaped up from his seat, and shouted above the wind like a man possessed. My goch, the very place. You've been fetching, though. Yes, you have. The street, holy sailor, there it is. Brownie at your still. A heifer, is it? Get up, Molly. A taste of the whip will do the man no harm, sir. My sakes, here's old Flora hobbling out to meet us. Got the romantics, has she? Set me down, Caesar. Here we are, man. Lord alive, the smell of the cowhouse. That warm and damp, it's grand. What, don't you know me, Flo? Got your temper still, if you've lost your teeth? My sakes, the haggard. The same spot again. It's turf they're burning inside. And my gracious, that's herrings roasting in their brine. Where's Granny, though? Let's put a sight in, Caesar. Well, well, oh, well, oh, well. Thus Pete came home, laughing, shouting, balling, and bellowing above the tumult of the wind, which had risen by this time to the strength of a gale. Mother cried Caesar going in at the porch. Gentlemen, hear from foreign parts to put a word on you. I never had nobody there belonging to me, began Granny. No, then nobody, said Caesar. One that was going to be, may be, if he'd lived, poor boy. Granny shouted Pete, and he burst into the bar room. Goodness me, cried Granny. It's his own voice, anyway. It's himself shouted Pete, and the old soul was in his arms in an instant. Oh, dear, oh, dear, she panted. Pete it is for sure. Let me sit down, though. Did you think it was his ghost, then, Mother? said Caesar, with an indulgent air? Dear, no, said Granny. The lad wouldn't come back to plague, nobody thinks I. Still, and for all the uprisement of Peter, it baits everything, said Caesar. It's a sort of a resurrection. I thought I'd have a sight up to the packet for his chist, poor fellow. And behold ye, who should I meet in the two eyes, but the man himself? Oh, dear, it's wonderful. It's terrible. I'm silly with the joy, said Granny. It was lies in the letter the Manx ones were writing, said Caesar. Letters and writings are all lies, said Granny. As long as I live, I'll take no more of them. And if that Kelly the Postman comes here again, I'll take the bellows to him. So you thought I was gone for good, Granny, said Pete? Well, I thought so, too. Well, I'd die, I says to myself, times and times. But overthought me at last. There wasn't no sense in a good man like me leaving his bones out on the bare-belt yonder. So, you see, I spread my wings and came home again. It's the Lord's doings. It's marvellous in our eyes, said Caesar. And Granny, who had recovered herself and was bustling about, cried. Let me have a ripe look at him, then. Goodness me, the whisker, and as soft as Manx carding from the mill, too. I like him best when he takes off his hat. Well, I'm proud to see you, boy. Deed, but I wouldn't have known you, though. Who's the gentleman in the geek with father, thinks I? And I'd have said it was the demster himself if he hadn't been dead and in his coffin. That'll do, that'll do, roared Pete. That's Granny putting the fun on me. It's no use talking, but I can't keep quiet. No, I can't, cried Granny. And with that, she whipped up a bowl from the kitchen dresser and fell furiously to peeling the potatoes that were there for supper. But where's Kate, said Pete? Oh, yes, where is she? Kate, Kate, called Granny, leaning her head towards the stairs. And Nancy Joe, who had been standing silent until now, said, didn't she go to Ramsey with a geek woman? Oh, the foolish I am. Of course she did, said Granny. But why hasn't she come back with father? She left word at Crelan's not to wait, said Caesar. She'll be gone to Miss Cluchus's to try on, said Nancy. Wouldn't trust now, said Granny. She's having two new dresses done, Pete. Oh, girls are terrible. Well, can you blame them, either? She shall have two and twenty if she likes, God bless, said Pete. Go on, as me, said Nancy. Is the man for buying frocks for a Mormon? But you'll be empty, boy. Put the crow down and the griddle on, Nancy, said Granny. We'll have cakes. Cakes? Of course, I said cakes. Get me the cloth, and I'll lay it myself. The cloth, I'm saying, woman. Did you never hear of a tablecloth? Where is it? Oh, dear knows where it is now. It's in the parlour. No, it's in the chest on the landing. No, it's under the sheets of my own bed. Fetch it, boch. Will I bring you a handful of gorse, mother, said Caesar? Course you will, and not stand chattering there. But I'm leaving you dry, Pete. Is it ale you'll have, or a drop of hard stuff? You'll wait for Kate? No, I like that. There's some life at these totals. Steady abroad? How dear you, Nancy Jo, you're a deal too clever. Of course he's been steady abroad. Steady as a gun. But Kate, said Pete, tramping the sanded floor. Is she changed at all? Oh, she's a woman now, boy, said Granny. Bless my soul, said Pete. She was looking a bit white and nervous one while there, but she sprung out of it fresh and bright. Same as the ling on the mountains. Well, that's the way with young women. I know, said Pete, just the break of the morning with the darlings. But she's the best-looking girl on the island now, Pete, said Nancy Jo. I'll go bail on it, cried Pete. Big and fine and rosy and fit for anything. Bless my heart. You should have seen her at the Malia. It was a trait. God bless me. Sun bonnet and pink frock and tight red stockings and straight as a standard rays. Hold your tongue, woman, shouted Pete. I'll see herself first and I'm dying to do it. Caesar came back with the gorse. Nancy fed the fire and Granny stirred the oatmeal and water. And while the cakes were baking, Pete trampled the kitchen and examined everything and recognized all friends with a roar. Bless me, the same place still. There's the clock on the shelf with the scratch on its face and the big finger broke at the joint and the laugh and the peck and the whip. You've had it new-corded, though. Sakes how the boy remembers, cried Granny. And the white rompy. The cat had leapt onto the dresser out of the reach of Pete's dog and from that elevation was eyeing him steadfastly. And the slurry and the kettle and the poker, my gracious, the very poker. Ah, did you ever, cried Granny, with amazement? And yes, no, it is, though. I'll swear it before the demster. That's, said Pete, picking up a three-legged stool. That's the very stool she was sitting on herself in the fire seat in front of the turf closet. Let me sit there now for the sake of all times gone by. He put the stool in the fireplace and sat on it, shouting as he did so between a laugh and a cry. Oh, Granny Bock, Granny Bock, to think there's been half the will between us since I was sitting here before. And Granny herself, breaking down, said, Wouldn't you like the tongs, boy? Give the boy the tongs, woman, just to say he's at home. Pete plucked the tongs out of Nancy's hands and began feeding the fire with the gorse. Oh, Granny, have I ever been away, he cried, laughing and his wet eyes gleaming. Nancy Joe, have you no nose at all, cried Granny? The cake's burning to a cinder. Let it burn, mother, shouted Pete. It's the way she was doing herself when she was young and forgetting. She'll links a piece for all that's wasted. Oh, the smell of it sweet. So saying, he piled the gorse on the fire, ramming it under the griddle and choking it behind the crow. And while the oat cake crackled and sparched and went black, he sniffed up the burning odor and laughed and cried in the midst of the smoke that went swirling up the chimney. And meanwhile, Granny herself, with the tears rolling down her cheeks, was flapping her apron before her face and saying, You'll make me die of laughing, he will, though. Yes, he will. And behind the apron, she was blubbering to Nancy. It's coming home, woman. That's it. It's just coming home again, poor boy. By this time, word of Pete's return had gone round Solby. And the bar room was soon throng with men and women who looked through the glass partition into the kitchen at the bronzed and bearded man who sat smoking by the fire with his dog curled up at his feet. There'll be a wedding soon, said one. The girls in luck said another. Success to the fine girl she always was, and lucky they kept her from the poor toot that was beating about on her poor bow. The young ballowane, eh? Who else? Presently the dog went out to them, and in default of its master became a centre of excited interest. It was an old creature with a subtle look of age and a gravity of expression that seemed to say he had got over the follies of youth and was now reserved and determined to keep the peace. His back was curved in, as if a cartwheel had gone over his spine. He had gigantic ears, a stump of a tail, a cope thin and prickly like the bristles of a pig, but white and spotted with brown. Lord Savus, a queer dog, though. What's his breed at all, said one. And then a resounding voice came from the kitchen doorway, saying, A sort of a manxman crossed with a bat. Got no tail to speak of, but there's plenty of ears at him. A handy sort of dog, only a bit spoiled in his childhood. Not fit for much company anyway, and no more notion of decent behaviour than my old shoe. Down, Dempster, down. It was Pete. He was greeted with loud welcomes and soon filled the room all round with the steaming odour of spirits and water. You've the manxed tongue at you still, Mr. Quilliam, said Jeanneque. And you're calling the dog Dempster. What's that for at all? For the sake of the old island, Mr. Jelly, and for the straighties like Dempster Millray when he's a bit crooked, said Pete. The old man's dead, sir, said John the Clark. You don't say, said Pete. Yes, though, the sun went down on him a Wednesday. The drink, sir, the drink. I've been cutting a sod of his grave today. And who's to be Dempster now, asked Pete. Who are they putting in for it? Well, said John the Clark. They're talking and talking. And some saying this one and others that one. But the most is saying you're all friend Philip Christian. I knew it. I always said it, shouted Pete. Best man in the island, bar none. Oh, he'll not dissave me. The wind was roaring in the chimney and the light was beginning to sail. Pete became restless and walked to and fro, peering out at intervals by the window that looked onto the road. At this there was some pushing and nudging and indulging whispering. It's the girl. Oh, be easy with the like. Five years apart, be easy. The meadows white with the gulls sitting together like parrots. What's that a sign or a father, said Pete? Just a slant of rain, maybe, and a puff of wind, said Caesar. But, said Pete, looking up at the sky, the long cat tail was going off at a slant a while ago. And now the thick-skate yonder is hanging mortal low. Take your time, sir, said Caesar. No need to send round the cross, Wooster. Pirey cross yet. The girl will be home immediately. It'll be dark at her, though, said Pete. The company tried to draw him into conversation about the ways of life in the countries he had visited. But he answered absently and jerkily and kept going to the door. Suppose there'll be demsters enough where you're coming from, said Genaig? Sort of demsters, yes. Call one of them old necessity, because it knows no law. He rigged up the statute books atop of his stool for a high seat. And when he wanted them, he couldn't find them high or low. Not the first judge that sat on the law, though? It's coming, Caesar. Do you hear it? That's the rain on the street. Aisy, man, aisy, man, said Caesar. New dresses isn't rigged up in no time. There will be chapels now, eh? Chapels and conferences and proper religious instruction. Dival a chapel, sir. Only a rickety barn belonging to someones they're calling the sky pilots to. Wanted the old miser that runs it to build them a new tabernacle. But he wouldn't part till a lump of plaster fell on his bald head at a love-feast. And then he planked down a hundred pound, and they all shouted, Hit him again, lord, you might. Do you hear that, then? That's the water coming down from the gill. I can't stand no more of it, Granny. Granny was at the door, struggling to hold it against the wind, while she looked out into the gathering darkness. Deed, but I'm getting afraid of it myself, she said, and dear heart knows where Ciri can be at this time of night. I'm off to find her, said Pete, and catching up his hat and whistling to the dog in a moment he was gone. End of Part 3, Chapter 9. Part 3, Chapter 10 of the Manxman. This is a Librivox record. All Librivox recordings were in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org. Recording by Tony Ashworth. The Manxman by Sir Hall Cain. Part 3, Chapter 10. The door was hard to close behind him, for it was now blowing a gale from the northeast. Caesar slipped through the dairy to see if the outbuildings were safe, and came back with a satisfied look. The stable and cowhouse were barred. The barns were shut up, the mill-wheel was on a break, the kiln fire was burning gently, and all was snug and tight. Granny was wringing her hands as he returned, crying, Kate, oh Kate, and he reproved her for want of trust in providence. People were now coming in rapidly with terrible stories of damage done by the storm. It was reported that the chicken-rocked lighthouse was blown down, that the tide had risen to 25 feet in Ramsey, and torn up the streets, and that appeal fishermen had been struck by his mainsail into the sea and drowned. More came into their house at every minute, and among them were all the lonesome and helpless ones within a radius of a mile. Blind Jane who charmed blood, but could not charm the wind, Shamir that profited, with beard down to his waist, and a staff up to his shoulder, an old-drawn vessie who lived on the houses in the way of a tramp. The people who had been there already were afraid to go out, and Granny still wringing her hands and crying, Kate, Kate, called everybody into the kitchen to gather about the fire. There they bemoaned their boys on the sea, told stories of former storms, and quarreled about the years of wrecks and the sources of the winds that caused them. The gale increased to fearful violence, and sometimes the wind sounded like sheets flapping against the walls, sometimes like the deep boom of the waves that roll on themselves in mid-ocean and never know ashore. It began to groan in the chimney, as if it were a wild beast struggling to escape, and then the smoke came down in whirls and filled the kitchen. They had to put out the fire to keep themselves from suffocation, and to sit back from the fireplace to protect themselves from cold. The door of the porch flew open, and they barricaded it with long-handled brushes. The windows rattled in their frames, and they blocked them up with the tops of the tables. In spite of all efforts to shut out the wind, the house was like a basket, and it quaked like a ship at sea. I never heard the like on the water itself, and I'm used of the sea, too, said one. The others groaned and mumbled prayers. Kelly the Thief, who had come in unopposed by Granny, was on his knees in one corner with his face to the wall, calling on the Lord to remember that he had seen things in letters, stamps and such, but had never touched them. John the Clark was saying that he had to bury the deemster, Johnnake the barber, that he had been sent for to cut the bishop, and Claudius Culey the farmer, that he had three fields of barley still uncut, and a stack of oats unthatched. Oh, Lord, cried Claudius, let me not die till I've got nothing to do. Caesar stood like a strong man amidst thick moans and groans, the bowings of the head and clappings of the hands, and when he heard the farmer his look was severe. Claudius said he, how do you dare to doubt the providence of God? Easy to talk, Mr. Greguine, the farmer whined, but you've got your own harvest saved, and then Caesar had no resource but to punish the man in prayer. The Lord had sent his storm to reprove some that were making too sure of his mercies, but there was grace in the gale, only they wouldn't be patient and trust to God's providence. There was milk in the breast, only the wayward child wouldn't take time to find the teat. Lord, lead them to true stillness. In the midst of Caesar's prayer there was a sudden roar outside, and he leapt abruptly to his feet with a look of excitation. I believe in my heart that's the mill-wheel broke and loose, said he, and if it is the corn on the kiln will be going like a whirling-gig. Trust in God's providence, Caesar cried the farmer. So I will, said Caesar, catching up his hat, but I'll put out my kiln fire first. When Pete stepped out of the porch he felt himself smitten as by an invisible wing, and he gasped like a fish with too much air. A quick pain in the side at that moment reminded him of his bullet wound, but his heels had heart in them, and he set off to run. The night had fallen, but a green rent was torn in the leaden sky, and through this the full moon appeared. When he got to Ramsay the tide was up to the old cross, slates were flying like kites, and the harbour sounded like a battlefield with its thunderous roar of rigging. He made for the dressmakers and heard that Kate had not been there for six hours. At the drapers he learned that at two o'clock in the afternoon she had been seen going up Baleur. The sound rocket was fired as he pushed through the town. A schooner riding to an anchor in the bay was flying her ensign for help. The sea was terrific. A slaty grey streak with white foam like quartz veins, but the men who had been idling on the key when the water was calm were now struggling, chafing, and fighting to go out on it, for the blood of the old Vikings was in them. Going by the water trough, Pete called on Black Tom, who was civil and consolatory, until he heard his errand, then growled with disappointment, but nevertheless answered his question. Yes, he had seen the young woman. She went up early in the Ivarin, and left him good day. Giving this grateful news, Black Tom could not deny himself a word of bitterness to poison the pleasure. And when you were finding her, said he, you'll be doing well to take her in tow, for I'm thinking there's some that's for throwing her a rope. Who'd you mean? said Pete. I'll leave it to you, said Black Tom, and Pete pulled the door after him. On the breast of the hill there was the meeting of two roads, one of them leading up to the hibernian, the other going down to Port Moor. To resolve the difficulty of choice, Pete inquired at a cottage standing some paces beyond, and as Kate had not been seen to pass up the higher road, he determined to take the lower one. But he gathered no tidings by the way, for Billy by the mill knew nothing, and the woman by the sundial had gone to bed. At length he dipped into Port Moor, and came to a little cottage, like a child's Noah's Ark, with his tiny porch and red light inside, looking out on the white breakers that were racing along the beach. It was the cottage of the lobster-fisher. Pete inquired if he had seen Kate. He answered no. He had seen nobody that day but Mr. Christian. Which of the Christians? Mr. Philip Christian. The news carried only one message to Pete's mind. It seemed to explain something which had begun to perplex him. Why Philip had not met him at the quay, and why Kate had not heard of his coming. Clearly Philip was at present at Balour. He had not yet received the telegram addressed to Douglas. Pete turned back. Surely Kate had called somewhere. She would be at home by this time. He tried to run, but the wind was now on his face. It was veering northwards every minute, and rising to the force of a hurricane. He tied his handkerchief over his head, and under his chin to hold on his hat. His hair whipped his ears like rods. Sometimes he was swept into the hedge. Often he was brought to his knees. Still he toiled along through sheets of spray that glistened with the colors of a rainbow, and ran over the ground like driven rain. His eyes smarted, and the taste on his lips was salt. The moon was now riding at the full through a wild-flex sky, and Pete could clearly see as he returned towards the bay a crowd of human figures on the cliffs above Port Louaig. Quaking with undefined fears, he pushed on until he had joined them. The schooner, abandoned by her crew, had parted her cable, and was rolling like a blinded porpoise towards the rocks. She fell on them with the groan of a living creature, and the instant her head was down, the white lines of the sea leapt over her with a howl. The water swirled through her bulwarks, and filled her hatches. Her rudder was unshipped, her sails were torn from their gaskets, and the floating home wherein men had sailed and sung and slept and laughed and gested, was a broken wreck in the heavy wallowings of the waves. Kate had not returned when Pete got back to Solby, but the excitement of her absence was eclipsed for the time by the turmoil of Caesar's trouble. Standing in the dark on the top of the midden, he was shouting to the dairy door in a voice of thunder, which went off at the end of his beard like the pooling of a cat. The mill-wheel was going, same as a whirling-gig. Was there nobody to hold the break? The stable roof was stripped, and the mayor was tearing herself to pieces in a roaring pit of hell. Was there never a shoulder for the door? The cowhouse thatch was flapping like a sail. Was there nothing in the world but a woman, Nancy Jo, to help a man to throw a ladder and a stone over it? Only when Caesar had been pacified was the silence to speak of Kate. I picked up news of her coming back by clock Bane, said Pete, and traced her as near home as the ginger. She can't be far away. Where is she? Those who were cool enough fell to conjecture. Granny had no resource but groans. Nancy was moaning by her side. The rest were full of their own troubles. Blind Jane was bewailing her affliction. You can all see, she cried, but I'm not knowing the harm that's coming on me. Hush, woman, hush, said Pete. We're all same as yourself, half alive. We're all blind at night. In the midst of the tumult, a knock came to the door, and Pete made a plunge towards the porch. Wait, cried Caesar. Nobody else comes here tonight except the girl herself. Another wind like the last, and we'll have the roof of the house, too. Then he called the newcomer with his face to the porch door, and the answer came back to him in a wail like the wind itself. Who's there? It was Joni from the Glen. We're like herrings in a barrel. We can't let you in. She wasn't wanting to come in, but her roof was going stripping, and half her house was felled, and she couldn't get her son, the idiot boy, to leave his bed. He would perish. He would die. He was all the families she had left to her. Wouldn't the master come and save him? Impossible, shouted Caesar. We have our own missing this fearful night, Joni, and the Lord will protect his children. Was it Kate? She had seen her in the Glen. Let me get her that door, said Pete. But the house will come down, cried Caesar. Let it come, said Pete. Pete shut the door of the bar room, and then the wind was heard to swirl through the porch. When did you see her, Joni, and where, said the voice of Pete? And the voice of Joni answered him. Goings by my own house at the start of the storm this everon. I'll come with you, go on, said Pete, and Granny shouted across the bar. Take Caesar's topcoat over your monkey-jacket. I've sailed enough already for a wind like this mother, cried the voice of Pete, and then the swirling sound in the porch went off with a long drawn whir, and Caesar came back alone to the kitchen. Pete's wound ached again, but he pressed his hand on the place of it, and struggled up the Glen, dragging Joni behind him. They came to her house at last. One half of the thatch lay over the other half. The rafters were bare like the ribs of the wreck. The oat-caped peck was rattling on the lath. The meal-barrel in the corner was stripped of its lid. And the meal was whirling into the air like a water-spout. The dresser was stripped, the broken crockery lay on the uncovered floor, and the iron slurry hanging over the place of the fire was swinging and striking against the wall, and ringing like a nail. And in the midst of the scene of desolation the idiot boy was placidly sleeping on his naked bed, and over it the moon was scutting through a tattered sky. The night wore on, and the company in the kitchen listened long and sometimes heard sounds as the voices crying in the wind, but Pete did not return. Then they fell to groaning again, to praying aloud without fear, and to confessing their undiscovered sins without shame. I'm searched terrible. I can see through me, cried Kelly, the postman. Some were chiefly troubled lest death should fall on them while they were in a public house. I keep none, cried Caesar. But you wouldn't let us open the door, whined the farmer. If the door had been wide enough for a bishop, not a soul would have stirred. For the first time within anyone's recollection Nancy Jo was on her knees. Oh Lord, she prayed, thou knowest well I don't often bother thee, but save Kate, Lord, oh save and preserve my little Kirrie. It's twenty years and better since I asked anything of thee before, and if thou wilt only take away this wind, I'll promise not to say another prayer for twenty years more. Said in Manx woman, Mo and Granny, I always say my prayers in Manx as well, and the Lord can listen to the one he knows best. There's prayer as well as praise in singing, cried Caesar, and they began to sing, all down on their knees, their eyes tightly closed, and their hands clasped before their faces. They sang of heaven and its peaceful plains, its blue lakes and sunny skies, its golden cities and emerald gates, its temples and its tavernacles, where congregations ne'er break up and savoths never end. It was some comfort to drown with the wild discord of their own voices, the fearful noises of the tempest. When they finished the hymn they began on it again, keeping it up without a break, sweeping the dying note of the last word into the rising pitch of the first one. In the midst of their singing, they thought a fiercer gust than ever was beating on the door, and to smother the fear of it, they sang yet louder. The gust came a second time, and Caesar cried, again brothers, and away they went with another wild whoop through the hymn. It came a third time, and Caesar cried, once more beloved, and they raced madly through the hymn again. Then the door burst open as before a tremendous kick, and Pete, fierce and wild-eyed, and green with the drift of the salt foam cake thick on his face. Stepped over the threshold, with the unconscious body of Kate in his arms, and the idiot boy peering over his shoulder. Thank the Lord for an answer to prayer, cried Caesar. Where did you find her? In the tolten up the glen, said Pete, up in the witch's tolten, end of part 3 chapter 10.