The Deemster Part 26

"Do you believe _that_?" he said, in a slow whisper.

"Don't deny it--don't let me know you for a liar as well," Ewan said, eagerly; and then added in another tone, "I have had her own confession."

"Her confession?"

"Yes, and the witness of another."

"The witness of another!"

Dan echoed Ewan's words in a vague, half-conscious way.

Then, in a torrent of hot words that seemed to blister and sting the man who spoke them no less than the man who heard them, Ewan told all, and Dan listened like one in a stupor.

There was silence, and then Ewan spoke again in a tone of agony. "Dan, there was a time when in spite of yourself I loved you--yes, though I'm ashamed to say it, for it was against G.o.d's own leading; still I loved you, Dan. But let us part forever now, and each go his own way, and perhaps, though we can never forget the wrong that you have done us, we may yet think more kindly of you, and time may help us to forgive--"

But Dan had awakened from his stupor, and he flung aside.

"d.a.m.n your forgiveness!" he said, hotly, and then, with teeth set and lips drawn hard and eyes aflame, he turned upon Ewan and strode up to him, and they stood together face to face.

"You said just now that there was not room enough in the island for you and me," he said, in a hushed whisper. "You were right, but I shall mend your words: if you believe what you have said--by Heaven, I'll not deny it for you!--there is not room enough for both of us in the world."

"It was my own thought," said Ewan, and then for an instant each looked into the other's eyes and read the other's purpose.

The horror of that moment of silence was broken by the lifting of the latch. Davy Fayle came shambling into the tent on some pretended errand.

He took off his militia belt with the dagger in the sheath attached to it, and hung it on a long rusty nail driven into an upright timber at one corner. Then he picked up from among some ling on the floor a waterproof coat and put it on. He was going out, with furtive glances at Dan and Ewan, who said not a word in his presence, and were bearing themselves toward each other with a painful constraint, when his glance fell on the hatchet which lay a few feet from the door. Davy picked it up and carried it out, muttering to himself, "Strange, strange, uncommon!"

Hardly had the boy dropped the latch of the door from without than Ewan took the militia belt from the nail and buckled it about his waist. Dan understood his thought; he was still wearing his own militia belt and dagger. There was now not an instant's paltering between them--not a word of explanation.

"We must get rid of the lad," said Dan.

Ewan bowed his head. It had come to him to reflect that when all was over Mona might hear of what had been done. What they had to do was to be done for her honor, or for what seemed to be her honor in that blind tangle of pa.s.sion and circ.u.mstance. But none the less, though she loved both of them now, would she loathe that one who returned to her with the blood of the other upon him.

"She must never know," he said. "Send the boy away. Then we must go to where this work can be done between you and me alone."

Dan had followed his thought in silence, and was stepping toward the door to call to Davy, when the lad came back, carrying a log of driftwood for the fire. There were some small flakes of snow on his waterproof coat.

"Go up to the shambles, Davy," said Dan, speaking with an effort at composure, "and tell Jemmy Curghey to keep me the ox-horns."

Davy looked up in a vacant way, and his lip lagged low. "Aw, and didn't you tell Jemmy yourself, and terrible partic'lar, too?"

"Do you say so, Davy?"

"Sarten sure."

"Then just slip away and fetch them."

Davy fixed the log on the fire, tapped it into the flame, glanced anxiously at Dan and Ewan, and then in a lingering way went out. His simple face looked sad under its vacant expression.

The men listened while the lad's footsteps could be heard on the shingle, above the deep murmur of the sea. Then Dan stepped to the door and threw it open.

"Now," he said.

It was rapidly growing dark. The wind blew strongly into the shed. Dan stepped out, and Ewan followed him.

They walked in silence through the gully that led from the creek to the cliff head. The snow that had begun to fall was swirled about in the wind that came from over the sea, and spinning in the air, it sometimes beat against their faces.

Ewan went along like a man condemned to death. He had begun to doubt, though he did not know it, and would have shut his mind to the idea if it had occurred to him. But once, when Dan seemed to stop as if only half resolved, and partly turn his face toward him, Ewan mistook his intention. "He is going to tell me that there is some hideous error," he thought. He was burning for that word. But no, Dan went plodding on again, and never after shifted his steadfast gaze, never spoke, and gave no sign. At length he stopped, and Ewan stopped with him. They were standing on the summit of Orris Head.

It was a sad, a lonesome, and a desolate place, in sight of a wide waste of common land, without a house, and with never a tree rising above the purple gorse and tussocks of long gra.s.s. The sky hung very low over it; the steep red cliffs, with their patches of green in ledges, swept down from it to the shingle and the sharp shelves of slate covered with seaweed. The ground swell came up from below with a very mournful noise, but the air seemed to be empty, and every beat of the foot on the soft turf sounded near and large. Above their heads the sea-fowl kept up a wild clamor, and far out, where sea and sky seemed to meet in the gathering darkness, the sea's steady blow on the bare rocks of the naze sent up a deep, hoa.r.s.e boom.

Dan unbuckled his belt, and threw off his coat and vest. Ewan did the same, and they stood there face to face in the thin flakes of snow, Dan in his red shirt, Ewan in his white shirt open at the neck, these two men whose souls had been knit together as the soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David, and each ready to lift his hand against his heart's best brother. Then all at once a startled cry came from near at hand.

It was Davy Fayle's voice. The lad had not gone to the shambles.

Realizing in some vague way that the errand was a subterfuge and that mischief was about, he had hidden himself at a little distance, and had seen when Dan and Ewan came out of the tent together. Creeping through the ling, and partly hidden by the dusk, he had followed the men until they had stopped on the Head. Then Davy had dropped to his knees. His ideas were obscure, he scarcely knew what was going on before his eyes, but he held his breath and watched and listened. At length, when the men threw off their clothes, the truth dawned on Davy; and though he tried to smother an exclamation, a cry of terror burst from his husky throat.

Dan and Ewan exchanged glances, and each seemed in one moment to read the other's thoughts. In another instant, at three quick strides, Dan had taken Davy by the shoulders.

"Promise," he said, "that you will never tell what you have seen."

Davy struggled to free himself, but his frantic efforts were useless. In Dan's grip he was held as in a vice.

"Let me go, Mastha Dan," the lad cried.

"Promise to hold your tongue," said Dan; "promise it, promise it."

"Let me go, will you? let me go," the lad shouted sullenly.

"Be quiet," said Dan.

"I won't be quiet," was the stubborn answer. "Help! help! help!" and the lad screamed l.u.s.tily.

"Hold your tongue, or by G--"

Dan held Davy by one of his great hands. .h.i.tched into the lad's guernsey, and he lifted the other hand threateningly.

"Help! help! help!" Davy screamed still louder, and struggled yet more fiercely, until his strength was spent, and his breath was gone, and then there was a moment's silence.

The desolate place was still as desolate as before. Not a sign of life around; not an answering cry.

"There's n.o.body to help you," said Dan. "You have got to promise never to tell what you have seen to man, woman, or child."

"I won't promise, and I won't hould my tongue," said the lad, stoutly.

"You are goin' to fight, you and Mastha Ewan, and--"

Dan stopped him. "Hearken here. If you are to live another hour, you will promise--"

But Davy had regained both strength and voice.

"I don't care--help! help! help!" he shouted.