The Deemster Part 3

The girl stood without a word, and not one streak of color came to her white cheeks as her mother spoke.

"She denied it, and denied it, and said no, and no; but leave it to a mother to know what way her girl's going."

There was a low murmur among the people at the back and some whispering.

The girl's keen ear caught it, and she turned her head over her shoulder with a defiant glance.

"Who is the man?" said the Archdeacon, recalling her with a touch of his finger on her arm.

She did not answer at first, and he repeated the question.

"Who is the guilty man?" he said, in a voice more stern.

"It's not true. Let me go," said the girl, in a quick undertone.

"Who is the partner of your sin?"

"It's not true, I say. Let me go, will you?" and the girl struggled feebly in the sumner's grip.

"Bring her to the altar," said the Archdeacon. He faced about and walked toward the chancel, and entered it. The company followed him and drew up outside the communion rail. He took a Testament from the reading-desk and stepped toward the girl. There was a dead hush.

"The Church provides a remedy for slander," he said, in a cold, clear tone. "If you are not guilty, swear that you are innocent, that he who tampers with your good name may beware." With that the Archdeacon held the Testament toward the girl. She made no show of taking it. He thrust it into her hand. At the touch of the book she gave a faint cry and stepped a pace backward, the Testament falling open on to the penitent-form beneath.

Then the murmur of the bystanders rose again. The girl heard it once more, and dropped on her knees and covered her face, and cried, in a tremulous voice that echoed over the church, "Let me go, let me go."

The company that came for the christening had walked up the aisle.

Blinking Kerry stood apart, hushing the infant in her arms; it made a fretful whimper. Thorkell stood behind, pawing the paved path with a restless foot. His wife had made her way to the girl's side, her eyes overflowing with compa.s.sion.

"Take her to prison at the Peel," said the Archdeacon, "and keep her there until she confesses the name of her paramour." At that, Thorkell's wife dropped to her knees beside the kneeling girl, and putting one arm about her neck, raised the other against the sumner, and cried, "No, no, no; she will confess."

There was a pause and a long hush. Mally let her hands fall from her face, and turned her eyes full on the eyes of the young mother at her side. In dead silence the two rose to their feet together.

"Confess his name; whoever he is, he does not deserve that you should suffer for him as well," said the wife of Thorkell Mylrea, and as she spoke she touched the girl's white forehead with her pale lips.

"Do _you_ ask that?" said Mally, with a strange quietness.

For one swift instant the eyes of these women seemed to see into each other's heart. The face of Thorkell's wife became very pale; she grew faint, and clutched the communion rail as she staggered back.

At the next instant Mally Kerruish was being hurried by the sumner down the aisle; the noisy concourse that had come with them went away with them, and in a moment more the old church was empty, save for the company that had gathered about the font.

There was a great feast at Ballamona that day. The new house was finished, and the young Christian, Ewan Mylrea, of Ballamona, was the first to enter it; for was it not to be his house, and his children's and his children's children's?

Thorkell's wife did not join the revels, but in her new home she went back to her bed. The fatigue and excitement of the day had been too much for her. Thorkell himself sat in his place, and laughed noisily and drank much. Toward sunset the sumner came to say that the girl who had been taken to prison at the Peel had confessed, and was now at large.

The Archdeacon got up and went out of the room. Thorkell called l.u.s.tily on his guests to drink again, and one stupefied old crony clambered to his feet and demanded silence for a toast.

"To the father of the girl's by-blow," he shouted, when the gla.s.ses were charged; and then the company laughed till the roof rang, and above all was the shrill laugh of Thorkell Mylrea. Presently the door opened again, and the Archdeacon, with a long, grave face, stood on the threshold and beckoned to Thorkell at the head of his table. Thorkell went out with him, and when they returned together a little later, and the master of Ballamona resumed his seat, he laughed yet more noisily than before, and drank yet more liquor.

On the outside of Ballamona that night an old woman, hooded and caped, knocked at the door. The loud laughter and the ranting songs from within came out to her where she stood in the darkness, under the silent stars.

When the door was opened by Hommy-beg the woman asked for Mylrea Ballamona. Hommy-beg repulsed her, and would have shut the door in her face. She called again, and again, and yet again, and at last, by reason of her importunity, Hommy-beg went in and told Thorkell, who got up and followed him out. The Archdeacon heard the message, and left the room at the same moment.

Outside, on the gravel path, the old woman stood with the light of the lamp that burned in the hall on her wizened face. It was Mrs. Kerruish, the mother of Mally.

"It's fine times you're having of it, Master Mylrea," she said, "and you, too, your reverence; but what about me and my poor girl?"

"It was yourself that did it, woman," said Thorkell; and he tried to laugh, but under the stars his laugh fell short.

"Me, you say? Me, was it for all? May the good G.o.d judge between us, Master Mylrea. D'ye know what it is that happened? My poor girl's gone."

"Gone!"

"Eh, gone--gone off--gone to hide her shameful face; G.o.d help her."

"Better luck," said Thorkell, and a short gurgle rattled in his dry throat.

"Luck, you call it? Luck! Take care, Ballamona."

The Archdeacon interposed. "Come, no threats, my good woman," he said, and waved his hand in protestation. "The Church has done you justice in this matter."

"Threats, your reverence? Justice? Is it justice to punish the woman and let the man go free? What! the woman to stand penance six Sabbaths by the church-door of six parishes, and the man to pay his dirty money, six pounds to you and three to me, and then no mortal to name his name!"

The old woman rummaged in the pocket at her side and pulled out a few coins. "Here, take them back; I'm no Judas to buy my own girl. Here, I say, take them!"

Thorkell had thrust his hands in his pockets, and was making a great show of laughing boisterously.

The old woman stood silent for a moment, and her pale face turned livid.

Then by a sudden impulse she lifted her eyes and her two trembling arms.

"G.o.d in Heaven," she said, in a hoa.r.s.e whisper, "let Thy wrath rest on this man's head; make this house that he has built for himself and for his children a curse to him and them and theirs; bring it to pa.s.s that no birth come to it but death come with it, and so on and on until Thou hast done justice between him and me."

Thorkell's laughter stopped suddenly. As the woman spoke his face quivered, and his knees shook perceptibly under him. Then he took her by the arms and clutched her convulsively. "Woman, woman, what are you saying?" he cried, in his shrill treble. She disengaged herself and went away into the night.

For a moment Thorkell tramped the hall with nervous footsteps. The Archdeacon stood speechless. Then the sound of laughter and of song came from the room they had left, and Thorkell flung in on the merry-makers.

"Go home, go home, every man of you! Away with you!" he shouted, hysterically, and then dropped like a log into a chair.

One by one, with many wise shakes of many sapient heads, the tipsy revelers broke up and went off, leaving the master of Ballamona alone in that chamber, dense with dead smoke, and noisome with the fumes of liquor.

CHAPTER IV

THE DEEMSTER OF MAN

Twenty times that night Thorkell devised expedients to break the web of fate. At first his thoughts were of revengeful defiance. By fair means or foul the woman Kerruish should suffer. She should be turned out of house and home. She should tramp the roads as a mendicant. He would put his foot on her neck. Then they would see what her uncanny threats had come to.

He tried this unction for his affrighted spirit, and put it aside as useless. No, no; he would conciliate the woman. He would settle an annuity of five pounds a year upon her; he would give her the snug gate cottage of old Ballamona to live in; his wife should send her warm blankets in winter, and sometimes a pound of tea, such as old folks love. Then must her imprecation fall impotent, and his own fate be undisturbed.

Thorkell's bedroom in his new house on Slieu Dhoo looked over the Curraghs to the sea. As the day dawned he opened the window, and thrust out his head to drink of the cool morning air. The sun was rising over the land behind, a strong breeze was sweeping over the marshes from the sh.o.r.e, and the white curves of the breakers to the west reflected here and there the glow of the eastern sky. With the salt breath of the sea in his nostrils, it seemed to Thorkell a pitiful thing that a man should be a slave to a mere idea; a thing for shame and humiliation that the sneezing of an old woman should disturb the peace of a strong man.