So Adam Fairbrother went his way, leaving Greeba behind him, and early the next morning Jason took her back to Lague.
CHAPTER III.
The Wooing of Jason
Now the one thing that Jason did not tell to Adam Fairbrother was that, on hearing from Jacob, as spokesman of his brothers, the story of their treatment of Greeba and their father, he had promised to break every bone in their six worthless bodies, and vowed never to darken their door again. His vow he could not keep if he was also to keep his word with Adam, and he deferred the fulfilment of his promise; but from that day he left Lague as a home, and pitched his tent with old Davy Kerruish in Maughold village, at a little cottage by the Sundial that stood by the gates of the church. Too old for the sea, and now too saintly for smuggling, Davy pottered about the churchyard as gravedigger – for Maughold had then no sexton – with a living of three and sixpence a service, and a marvellously healthy parish. So the coming of Jason to share bed and board with him was a wild whirl of the wheel of fortune, and straightway he engaged an ancient body at ninepence a week to cook and clean for them.
By this time Jason had spent nearly half his money, for he had earned nothing, but now he promptly laid his idle habits aside. No more did he go up to the mountains, and no longer out on to the sea. His nets were thrown over the lath of the ceiling, his decoy was put in a cage, his fowling piece stood in the corner, and few were the birds that hung at his belt. He was never seen at the "Hibernian," and he rarely scented up the house with tobacco smoke. On his first coming he lay two days and nights in bed without food or sleep, until Davy thought surely he was sick, and, willy-nilly, was for having his feet bathed in mustard and hot water, and likewise his stomach in rum and hot gruel. But he was only settling his plans for the future, and having hit on a scheme he leaped out of bed like a grayhound, plunged his head up to the neck in a bucket of cold water, came out of it with gleaming eyes, red cheeks and a vapor rising from his wet skin, and drying himself with a whir on a coarse towel, he laid hold with both hands of a chunk of the last hare he had snared, and munched it in vast mouthfuls.
"Davy," he cried, with the white teeth still going, "are there many corn mills this side of the island?"
"Och, no, boy," said Davy; "but scarce as fresh herrings at Christmas."
"Any mill nearer than old Moore's at Sulby, and Callow's wife's down at Laxey?"
"Aw, no, boy, the like of them isn't in."
"Any call for them nearer, Davy?"
"Aw 'deed, yes, boy, yes; and the farmer men alwis keen for one in Maughold, too. Ay, yes, keen, boy, keen; and if a man was after building one here they'd be thinking diamonds of him."
"Then why hasn't somebody set up a mill before now, Davy?"
"Well, boy, ye see a Manxman is just the cleverest of all the people goin' at takin' things aisy. Aw, clever at it, boy, clever!"
There is a full stream of water that tumbles into the sea over the brows of Port-y-Vullin, after singing its way down from the heights of Barrule. Jason had often marked it as he came and went from the hut of Stephen Orry that contained his stuffed birds, and told himself what a fine site it was for anybody that wanted to build a water mill. He remembered it now with a freshened interest, and bowling away to Mrs. Fairbrother at Lague for the purchase of a rod of the land that lay between the road and the beach, to the Bailiff for the right of water, and to old Coobragh for the hire of a cart to fetch stones from the screes where the mountains quarried them, he was soon in the thick of his enterprise.
He set the carpenter to work at his wheel, the smith at his axle, and the mason at his stones, but for the walls and roof of the mill itself he had no help but old Davy's. Early and late, from dawn to dusk, he worked at his delving and walling, and when night fell in he leaned over the hedge and smoked and measured out with his eye the work he meant to do next day. When his skill did not keep pace with his ardor he lay a day in bed thinking hard, and then got up and worked yet harder. In less than two months he had his first roof – timbers well and safely pitched, and if he went no farther it was because the big hope wherewith his simple heart had been buoyed up came down with a woeful crash.
"Aw, smart and quick, astonishin'," said old Davy of Jason to Mrs. Fairbrother at Lague. "Aw 'deed, yes, and clever to, and steady still. The way he works them walls is grand. I'll go bail the farming men will be thinking diamonds of him when he makes a start."
"And then I wouldn't doubt but he'll be in the way of making a fortune, too," said Mrs. Fairbrother.
"I wouldn' trust, I wouldn' trust," said Davy.
"And he'll be thinking of marrying, I suppose. Isn't he, Davy?" said Mrs. Fairbrother.
"Marrying, is it?" said Davy; "aw, divil a marry, ma'am. The boy's innocent. Aw, yes, innocent as a baby."
Mrs. Fairbrother had her own good reasons for thinking otherwise, though Jason came to Lague but rarely. So with hint and innuendo she set herself to see how Greeba stood towards the future she had planned for her. And Greeba was not slow to see her mother's serious drift under many a playful speech. She had spent cheerful hours at Lague since the sad surprise that brought her back. Little loth for the life of the farm, notwithstanding Ross's judgment, she had seemed to fall into its ways with content. Her mother's hints touched her not at all, for she only laughed at them with a little of her old gayety; but one day within the first weeks she met Jason, and then she felt troubled. He was very serious, and spoke only of what he was doing, but before his grave face her gay friendliness broke down in an instant.
Hurrying home she sat down and wrote a letter to Michael Sunlocks. Never a word had she heard from him since he left the island four years ago, so she made excuse of her father's going away to cover her unmaidenly act, and asked him to let her know if her father had arrived, and how he was and where, with some particulars of himself also, and whether he meant to come back to the Isle of Man, or had quite made his home in Iceland; with many a sly glance, too, at her own condition, such as her modesty could not forbear, but never a syllable about Jason, for a double danger held her silent on that head. This she despatched to him, realizing at length that she loved him, and that she must hear from him soon, or be lost to him forever.
And waiting for Michael's answer she avoided Jason. If she saw him on the road she cut across the fields, and if he came to the house she found something to take her out of the kitchen. He saw her purpose quickly, and his calm eyes saddened, and his strong face twitched, but he did not flinch; he went on with his work, steadily, earnestly, only with something less of heart, something less of cheer. Her mother saw it, too, and then the playful hints changed to angry threats.
"What has he done?" said Mrs. Fairbrother.
"Nothing," said Greeba.
"Have you anything against him?"
"No."
"Then why are you driving him from the house?"
Greeba could make no answer.
"Are you thinking of someone else?"
Again Greeba was silent.
"I'll beg of you to mend your manners," cried Mrs. Fairbrother. "It's full time you were wedded and gone."
"But perhaps I don't wish to leave home," said Greeba.
"Tush!" said Mrs. Fairbrother. "The lad is well enough, and if he hasn't land he has some money, and is like to have more. I'll give you a week to think of it, and if he ever comes and speaks for you I'll ask you to give him his civil answer. You will be three and twenty come Martinmas, and long before your mother was as old as that she had a couple of your brothers to fend for."
"Some of my brothers are nearly twice my age, and you don't ask them to marry," said Greeba.
"That's a different matter," said Mrs. Fairbrother.
It turned out that the week was more than enough to settle the difference between Greeba and her mother, for in less time than that Mrs. Fairbrother was stricken down by a mortal illness. It was only a month since she had turned Adam from her door, but her time was already at hand, and more than he predicted had come to pass. She had grown old without knowing a day's illness; her body, like a rocky headland that gives no sign of the seasons, had only grown harder every year, with a face more deeply seamed; but when she fell it was at one blow of life's ocean. Three little days she had lost appetite, on the morning of the fourth day she had found a fever in a neglected cattle trough that had drained into the well, and before night she had taken her death-warrant.
She knew the worst, and faced it, but her terror was abject. Sixty-five years she had scraped and scratched, but her time was come. She had thought of nothing save her treasure, and there it lay, yet it brought her no solace.
Two days she tossed in agony, remembering the past, and the price she had paid, and made others to pay, for all that she had held so dear and must leave so soon, for now it was nothing worth. Then she sent for the parson, Parson Gell, who was still living, but very old. The good man came, thinking his mission was spiritual comfort, but Mrs. Fairbrother would hear nothing of that. As she had lived without God in the world, even so did she intend to die. But some things that had gone amiss with her in her eager race after riches she was minded to set right before her time came to go. In lending she had charged too high an interest; in paying she had withheld too much for money; in seizing for mortgage she had given too little grace. So she would repay before it was too late, for Death was opening her hands.
"Send for them all," she cried; "there's Kinvig of Ballagawne, and Corlett's widow at Ballacreggan, and Quirk of Claughbane, and the children of Joughan the weaver at Sherragh Vane, and Tubman of Ginger Hall, and John-Billy-Bob at Cornah Glen, and that hard bargainer, old Kermode of Port-e-chee. You see, I remember them all, for I never forget anything. Send for them, and be quick fetching them, or it'll be waste of time for them to come."
"I'll do it, Mistress Fairbrother," mumbled the old parson through his toothless gums, "for right is right, and justice justice."
"Chut!" said Mrs. Fairbrother.
But the parson's deaf ears did not hear. "And, ah!" he said, "the things of this world seem worthless, do they not, when we catch a glimpse into eternity?"
"Less cry and more wool," said Mrs. Fairbrother, dryly. "I wouldn't trust but old as you are you'd look with more love on a guinea than the Gospel calls for."
The people answered the parson's summons quickly enough, and came to Lague next morning, the men in their rough beavers, the old women in their long blue cloaks, and they followed the old parson into Mrs. Fairbrother's room, whispering among themselves, some in a doleful voice others in an eager one, some with a cringing air, and others with an arrogant expression. The chamber was darkened by a heavy curtain over the window, but they could see Mrs. Fairbrother propped up by pillows, whereon her thin, pinched, faded face showed very white. She had slept never a moment of the night; and through all the agony of her body her mind had been busy with its reckonings. These she had made Greeba to set down in writing, and now with the paper on the counterpane before her, and a linen bag of money in her hand, she sat ready to receive her people. When they entered there was deep silence for a moment, wherein her eyes glanced over them, as they stood in their strong odors of health around her.
"Where's your brother, Liza Joughan?" she said to a young woman at the foot of the bed.
"Gone off to 'Meriky ma'am," the girl faltered, "for he couldn't live after he lost the land."
"Where's Quirk of Claughbane?" asked Mrs. Fairbrother, turning to the parson.
"The poor man's gone, sister," said the parson, in a low tone. "He died only the week before last."
Mrs. Fairbrother's face assumed a darker shade, and she handed the paper to Greeba.
"Come, let's have it over," she said, and then, one by one, Greeba read out the names.
"Daniel Kinvig, twelve pounds," Greeba read, and thereupon an elderly man with a square head stepped forward.
"Kinvig," said Mrs. Fairbrother, fumbling the neck of the linen bag, "you borrowed a hundred pounds for two years, and I charged you twelve per cent. Six per cent. was enough, and here is the difference back to your hand."
So saying, she counted twelve pound notes and held them out in her wrinkled fingers, and the man took them without a word.
"Go on," she cried, sharply.
"Mrs. Corlett, two pounds," read Greeba, and a woman in a widow's cap and a long cloak came up, wiping her eyes.
"Bella Corlett," said Mrs. Fairbrother, "when I took over Ballacreggan for my unpaid debt, you begged for the feather bed your mother died on and the chair that had been your father's. I didn't give them, though I had enough besides, so here are two pounds to you, and God forgive me."
The woman took the money and began to cry.
"God reward you," she whimpered. "It's in Heaven you'll be rewarded, ma'am."
But Mrs. Fairbrother brushed her aside, with an angry word and a fretful gesture, and called on Greeba for the next name on the list.
"Peter Kermode, twenty-four pounds ten shillings," read Greeba, and a little old man, with a rough head and a grim, hard, ugly face, jostled through the people about him.
"Kermode," said Mrs. Fairbrother, "you always tried to cheat me, as you try to cheat everybody else, and when you sold me those seventy sheep for six shillings apiece last back end you thought they were all taking the rot, and you lost thirty pounds by them and brought yourself to beggary, and serve you right, too. But I sold them safe and sound for a pound apiece three days after; so here's half of the difference, and just try to be honest for the rest of your days. And it won't be a long task, either, for it's plain to see you're not far from death's door, and it isn't worth while to be a blood-sucker."
At that she paused for breath, and to press her lean hand over the place of the fire in her chest.
"Ye say true, ma'am, aw, true, true," said the man, in a lamentable voice. "And in the house of death it must be a great consolation to do right. Let's sing wi' ye, ma'am. I'm going in the straight way myself now, and plaze the Lord I'll backslide no more."
And while he counted out the money in his grimy palm, the old hypocrite was for striking up a Ranter hymn, beginning —
"Oh, this is the God we adore,
Our faithful, unchangeable friend."
But Mrs. Fairbrother cried on him to be silent, and then gathering strength she went on with the others until all were done. And passing to each his money, as the grasp of Death's own hand relaxed the hard grip of her tight fingers, she trembled visibly, held it out and drew it back again, and held it out again, as though she were reluctant to part with it even yet.
And when all was over she swept the people out of the room with a wave of her hand, and fell back to the bolster.
Then Greeba, thinking it a favorable moment to plead for her father, mentioned his name, and eyed her mother anxiously. Mrs. Fairbrother seemed not to hear at first, and, being pressed, she answered wrathfully, saying she had no pity for her husband, and that not a penny of her money should go to him.
But late the same day, after the doctor, who had been sent for from Douglas, had wagged his head and made a rueful face over her, she called for her sons, and they came and stood about her, and Greeba, who had nursed her from the beginning, was also by her side.
"Boys," she said, between fits of pain, "keep the land together, and don't separate; and mind you bring no women here or you'll fall to quarrelling, and if any of you must marry let him have his share and go. Don't forget the heifer that's near to calving, and see that you fodder her every night. Fetch the geese down from Barrule at Martinmas, and count the sheep on the mountains once a week, for the people of Maughold are the worst thieves in the island."
They gave her their promise duly to do and not to do what she had named, and, being little used to such scenes, they grew uneasy and began to shamble out.
"And, boys, another thing," she said, faintly, stretching her wrinkled hand across the counterpane, "give the girl her rights, and let her marry whom she will."
This, also, they promised her; and then she, thinking her duty done as an honest woman towards man and the world, but recking nothing of higher obligations, lay backward with a groan.
Now it did not need that the men should marry in order that they might quarrel, for hardly was the breath out of their mother's body when they set to squabbling, without any woman to help them. Asher grumbled that Thurstan was drunken, Thurstan grumbled that Asher was lazy, Asher retorted that, being the eldest son, if he had his rights he would have every foot of the land, and Ross and Stean arose in fury at the bare thought of either being hands on their brother's farm or else taking the go-by at his hands. So they quarrelled, until Jacob said that there was plainly but one way of peace between them, and that was to apportion the land into equal parts and let every man take his share, and then the idleness of Asher and the drunkenness of Thurstan would be to each man his own affair. At that they remembered that the lands of Lague, then the largest estate on the north of the island, had once been made up of six separate farms, with a house to each of them, though five of the six houses had long stood empty. And seeing that there were just six of themselves it seemed, as Jacob said, as if Providence had so appointed things to see them out of their difficulty. But the farms, though of pretty equal acreage, were of various quality of land, and therein the quarrelling set in afresh.
"I'll take Ballacraine," said Thurstan.
"No, but I'll take it," said Jacob, "for I've always worked the meadows."
In the end they cast lots, and then, each man having his farm assigned to him, all seemed to be settled when Asher cried.
"But what about the girl?"
At that they looked stupidly into each other's faces, for never once in all their bickering had they given a thought to Greeba. But Jacob's resource was not yet at an end, for he suggested that Asher should keep her at Lague, and at harvest the other five should give her something, and that her keep and their gifts together should be her share; and if she had all she needed what more could she wish?
They did not consult Greeba on this head, and before she had time to protest they were in the thick of a fresh dispute among themselves. The meadow lands of Ballacraine had fallen to Jacob after all, while Thurstan got the high and stony lands of Ballafayle, at the foot of Barrule. Thurstan was less than satisfied, and remembering that Jacob had drawn out the papers for the lottery, he suspected cheating. So he made himself well and thoroughly drunk at the "Hibernian," and set off for Ballacraine to argue the question out. He found Jacob in no mood for words of recrimination, and so he proceeded to thrash him, and to turn him off the fat lands and settle himself upon them.
Then there was great commotion among the Fairbrothers, and each of the other four took a side in the dispute. The end of it all was a trial for ejectment at Deemster's Court at Ramsey, and another for assault and battery. The ejectment came first and Thurstan was ousted, and then six men of Maughold got up in the juror's box to try the charge of assault. There was little proof but a multitude of witnesses, and before all were heard the Deemster adjourned the court for lunch and ventilation, for the old courthouse had become poisonous with the reeking breath of the people that crowded it.
And the jury being free to lunch where they pleased, each of the parties to the dispute laid hold of his man and walked him off by himself, to persuade him, also to treat him, and perhaps to bribe him. Thus Thurstan was at the Saddle Inn with a juryman on either hand, and Jacob was at the Plough with as many by his side, and Ross and Stean had one each at the tavern by the Cross. "You're right," said the jurymen to Thurstan. "Drink up," said Thurstan to the jurymen. "I'm your man," said the jurymen to Jacob. "Slip this in your fob," said Jacob to the jurymen. Then they reeled back to the courthouse arm-in-arm, and when the six good men of Maughold had clambered up to their places again, the juror's box contained several quarts more ale than before.
The jury did not agree on a verdict, and the Deemster dismissed them with hot reproaches. But some justice to Greeba seemed likely to come of this wild farce of law, for an advocate, who had learned what her brothers were doing for her, got up a case against them, for lack of a better brief, and so far prevailed on her behalf that the Deemster ordered that each of the six should pay her eight pounds yearly, as an equivalent for the share of land they had unlawfully withheld.
Now Red Jason had spent that day among the crowd at the courthouse, and his hot blood had shown as red as his hair through his tanned cheeks, while he looked on at the doings of Thurstan of the swollen eyes, and Jacob of the foxy face. He stood up for a time at the back like a statue of wrath with a dirty mist of blood dancing before it. Then his loathing and scorn getting the better of him he cursed beneath his breath in Icelandic and English, and his restless hands scraped in and out of his pockets as if they itched to fasten on somebody's throat, or pick up something as a dog picks up a rat. All he could do was to curl his lip in a terrible grin, like the grin of a mastiff, until he caught a side-long glimpse of Greeba's face with the traces of tears upon it, and then, being unable to control any longer the unsatisfied yearning of his soul to throttle Jacob, and smash the ribs of Thurstan, and give dandified John a backhanded facer, he turned tail and slunk out of the place, as if ashamed of himself that he was so useless. When all was over he stalked off to Port-y-Vullin, but, too nervous to settle to his work that day, he went away in the evening in the direction of Lague, not thinking to call there, yet powerless to keep away.
Greeba had returned from Ramsey alone, being little wishful for company, so heavy was her heart. She had seen how her brothers had tried to rob her, and how beggarly was the help the law could give her, for though the one might order the others might not obey. So she had sat herself down in her loneliness, thinking that she was indeed alone in all the world, with no one to look up to any more, and no strong hand to rest on. It was just then that Jason pushed open the door of the porch, and stood on the threshold, in all the quiet strength of his untainted young manhood, and the calm breadth of his simple manner.
"Greeba, may I come in?" he said, in a low tone.
"Yes," she answered, only just audibly, and then he entered.
She did not raise her eyes, and he did not offer his hand, but as he stood beside her she grew stronger, and as she sat before him he felt that a hard lump that had gathered at his heart was melting away.
"Listen to me, Greeba," he said. "I know all your troubles, and I'm very sorry for them. No, that's not what I meant to say, but I'm at a loss for words. Greeba!"
"Yes?"
"Doesn't it seem as if Fate meant us to come together – you and I? The world has dealt very ill with both of us thus far. But you are a woman and I am a man; and only give me the right to fight for you – "
As he spoke he saw the tears spring to her eyes, and he paused and his wandering fingers found the hand that hung by her side.
"Greeba!" he cried again, but she stopped the hot flow of the words that she saw were coming.
"Leave me now," she said. "Don't speak to me to-day; no, not to-day, Jason. Go – go!"
He obeyed her without a word, and picking up his cap from where it had fallen at his feet, he left her sitting there with her face covered by her hands.
She had suddenly bethought herself of Michael Sunlocks; that she had pledged her word to wait for him, that she had written to him and that his answer might come at any time. Next day she went down to the post-office at Ramsey to inquire for a letter. None had yet come for her, but a boat from the Shetlands that might fetch mails from Iceland would arrive within three days. Prompt to that time she went down to Ramsey again, but though the boat had put into harbor and discharged its mails there was still no letter for her. The ordinary Irish trader between Dublin and Reykjavik was expected on its homeward trip in a week or nine days more, and Greeba's heart lay low and waited. In due course the trader came, but no letter for her came with it. Then her hope broke down. Sunlocks had forgotten her; perhaps he cared for her no longer; it might even be that he loved some one else. And so with the fall of her hope her womanly pride arose, and she asked herself very haughtily, but with the great tears in her big dark eyes, what it mattered to her after all. Only she was very lonely, and so weary and heart-sick, and with no one to look to for the cheer of life.
She was still at Lague, where her eldest brother was now sole master, and he was very cold with her, for he had taken it with mighty high dudgeon that a sister of his should have used the law against him. So, feeling how bitter it was to eat the bread of another, she had even begun to pinch herself of food, and to sit at meals but rarely.
But Jason came again about a fortnight after the trial, and he found Greeba alone as before. She was sitting by the porch, in the cool of the summer evening, combing out the plaits of her long brown hair, and looking up at Barrule, that was heaving out large and black in the sundown, with a nightcap of silver vapor over its head in the clouds.
"I can stay away no longer," he said, with his eyes down. "I've tried to stay away and can't, and the days creep along. So think no ill of me if I come too soon."
Greeba made him no answer, but thought within herself that if he had stayed a day longer he must have stayed a day too long.
"It's a weary heart I've borne," he said, "since I saw you last, and you bade me leave you, and I obeyed, though it cost me dear. But let that go."
Still she did not speak, and looking up into her face he saw how pale she was, and weak and ill as he thought.
"Greeba," he cried, "what has happened?"
But she only smiled and gave him a look of kindness, and said that nothing was amiss with her.
"Yes, by the Lord, but something is amiss," he said, with his blood in his face in an instant. "What is it?" he cried. "What is it?"
"Only that I have not eaten much to-day," she said, "that's all."
"All!" he cried. "All!"
He seemed to understand everything at a glance, as if the great power of his love had taught him.
"Now, by God – " he said, and shook his fist at the house in front of him.
"Hush!" Greeba whispered, "it is my own doing. I am loth to be beholden to any one, least of all to such as forget me."
The sweet tenderness of her look softened him, and he cast down his eyes again, and said:
"Greeba, there is one who can never forget you; morning and night you are with him, for he loves you dearly; ay, Greeba, as never maiden was loved by any one since the world began. No, there isn't the man born, Greeba, who loves a woman as he loves you, for he has nothing else to love in all the wide world."
She looked up at him as he spoke and saw the courage in his eyes, and that he who loved her stood as a man beside her. At that her heart swelled and her eyes began to fill, and he saw her tears and knew that he had won her, and he plucked her to his breast with a wild cry of joy, and she lay there and wept, while he whispered to her through her hair.
"My love! my love! love of my life!" he whispered.
"I was so lonely," she murmured.
"You shall be lonely no more," he whispered; "no more, my love, no more," and his soft words stole over her drooping head.
He stayed an hour longer by her side, laughing much and talking greatly, and when he went off she heard him break into a song as he passed out at the gate.
Then, being once more alone, she sat and tried to compose herself, wondering if she should ever repent what she had done so hastily, and if she could love this man as he well deserved and would surely wish. Her meditations were broken by the sound of Jason's voice. He was coming back with his happy step, and singing as merrily as he went.
"What a blockhead I am," he said, cheerily, popping his head in at the door. "I forgot to deliver you a letter that the postmaster gave me when I was at Ramsey this morning. You see it's from Iceland. Good news from your father, I trust. God bless him!"
So saying he pushed the letter into Greeba's hand and went his way jauntily, singing as before a gay song of his native country.
The letter was from Michael Sunlocks.