{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_21999/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_21999","id":"gutenberg_21999","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/21999","summary":null,"tags":["Category: British Literature","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Novels","Fiction"],"text":"E-text prepared by Suzanne Lybarger, Brian Janes, Janet Blenkinship, and\nthe Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team\n(https://www.pgdp.net)\n\n\n\nNote: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this\n      file which includes the original illustrations.\n      See 21999-h.htm or 21999-h.zip:\n      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/1/9/9/21999/21999-h/21999-h.htm)\n      or\n      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/1/9/9/21999/21999-h.zip)\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE WIND BLOWETH\n\nby\n\nDONN BYRNE\n\nAuthor of \"Messer Marco Polo,\" etc.\n\nIllustrated by George Bellows\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\nNew York\nThe Century Co.\nCopyright, 1922, by\nThe Century Co.\nPrinted in U. S. A.\n\n\n\n\nA DEDICATION: A PRAYER\n\n\nWhilst I was working on the various problems of \"The Wind\nBloweth\"--problems of wisdom, of color, of phrasing, and trying to\ncapture the elusive, unbearable ache that is the mainspring of humanity,\nand doing this through the medium of a race I knew best, a race that\naffirms the divinity of Jesus and yet believes in the little people of\nthe hills, a race that loves its own land, and yet will wander the wide\nworld over, a race that loves battle, and yet always falls--whilst doing\nthis, it seemed to me that I was capturing for an instant a beauty that\nwas dying slowly, imperceptibly, but would soon be gone.\n\nPerhaps it was the lilt of a Gaelic song in these pages that brought a\nsorrow on me. That very sweet language will be gone soon, if not gone\nalready, and no book learning will revive the suppleness of idiom, that\nhaunting misty loveliness.... It is a very pathetic thing to see a\nliterature and a romance die.\n\nBut then, what ever dies? There is only change. For people in the coming\ntimes the economist and the expert in politics may have the beauty and\nwisdom old men have known in poems and strange tales. A mammoth building\nis as romantic to a new age as were the subtle carvings of Phidias to\nGreeks of old. For the master of commerce an oil-driven steel ship has\nthe beauty old folk have seen in cloudy pyramids of sail. What we have\nconsidered beautiful will be quaint. And their tolerant smile will hurt\nus under the wind-swept grass.\n\nTo whomever this writing of mine may give a moment's thought, a moment's\ndreaming, I would ask a privilege, to call out of the romantic sunset\nthe memories of Irish writers whom it is deep in my heart to praise, not\nmasters of verse, but those whom in English we call novelists, being too\nexact in matters of language to name them poets: the Four Masters of\nDonegal who dedicated their tradition _do chum gloire De agus onora na h\nEireann_,--to the glory of God and the honor of Ireland,--so high their\nmotive was. And Thomas Moore, not as author of Irish ballads or of\n\"Lalla Rookh,\" but as writer of \"The Epicurean.\" And Lever and Lover.\nAnd William Carleton from the County of Tyrone. And gentle Gerald\nGriffin, dead at his desk. And Michael and John Banim, with their\n\"O'Hara Tales.\" And Sheridan Le Fanu, and Fitz-James O'Brien, who fell\nfighting for America. And Charles Kickham, who wrote \"Knocknagow.\" And I\nwas all but forgetting Oliver Goldsmith, Dr. Johnson's friend.\n\nOld fathers, old masters, I will never believe but that you wrote\nbecause it sprang from you as the lark sings in the high air. No little\nsum of money, no great man's patronage, no doffed caps of the populace,\ncould have moved you to strike out or write in one line. Old fathers,\nlet me say aloud your names; it will give me bravery. And, sirs, take\nthis book kindly to you. It is written caring nothing for money, nothing\nfor light acclaim. Its faults are because I cannot write better yet....\n\nDONN BYRNE\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n  PART                                              PAGE\n\n  I   DANCING TOWN                                    3\n\n  II  THE WAKE AT ARDEE                              57\n\n  III THE MOUTH OF HONEY                            109\n\n  IV  THE WRESTLER FROM ALEPPO                      169\n\n  V   THE VALLEY OF THE BLACK PIG                   229\n\n  VI  THE BOLD FENIAN MEN                           287\n\n  VII THE KINGDOM AND THE POWER AND THE GLORY       353\n\n\n\n\nPART ONE\n\nDANCING TOWN\n\n\nSection 1\n\nBecause it was his fourteenth birthday they had allowed him a day off\nfrom school, his mother doubtfully, his uncles Alan and Robin with their\nunderstanding grin. And because there was none else for him to play with\nat hurling or foot-ball, the other children now droning in class over\nCaesar's Gallic War, he had gone up the big glen. It was a very\nadventurous thing to go up the glen while other boys were droning their\nLatin like a bagpipe being inflated, while the red-bearded schoolmaster\ndrowsed like a dog. First you went down the graveled path, past the\ngreened sun-dial, then through the gate, then a half-mile or so along\nthe road, green along the edges with the green of spring, and lined with\nthe May hawthorn, white, clean as air, with a fragrance like sustained\nmusic, a long rill of rolling white cloud. There was nothing in the\nworld like the hawthorn. First it put out little bluish-green buds firm\nas elastic, and then came a myriad of white stars. And then the white\ndrift turned a delicate red, dropped, and the scarlet haws came out, a\ntasteless bread-like fruit you shared with the birds, and the stone of\nit you could whip through your lips like a bullet....\n\nHe left the main road and turned into a loaning that came down the\nmountain-side, a thing that once might have been a road, if there had\nbeen any need for it, or energy to make it. But now it was only a wedge\nof common land bounded on both sides by a low stone wall. Inside one\nwall was a path, and inside the other a little rill, and betwixt the two\nof them were firm moss and stones. And here the moss was yellowish-green\nand there red as blood. And the rill was edged with ferns and queer blue\nflowers whose names he did not know in English, and now the water just\ngurgled over the rounded stones, and now it dropped into a well where it\nwas colorless and cold and fresh as the air itself, and oftentimes at\nthe bottom of a pool like that would be a great green frog with eyes\nthat popped like the schoolmaster's....\n\nAnd to the left of the loaning as he walked toward the mountain was a\nplantation of fir-trees, twenty acres or more, the property of the third\ncousin of his mother's brother-in-law, a melancholy, thin-handed man\nwho lived on the Mediterranean--a Campbell, too, though one would never\ntake him for an Ulster Scot, with his la-di-da ways and his Spanish\nlady. But the queer thing about the plantation was this, that within,\nhalf a mile through the trees, were the ruins of a house, bare walls and\nbracken and a wee place where there were five graves, two of them\nchildren's. A strange thing the lonely graves. In summer the sun would\nshine through the clearing of the trees, and there was always a bird\nsinging somewhere near. But it was a gey lonely place for five folk to\nlie there, at all times and seasons, and in the moonlight and in the\nsunlight, and when the rain dripped from the fir-trees. And all the\ncompany they had was the red fox slipping through the trees or the\nrabbit hopping like a child at play or the hare-wide-eyed in the\nbracken. They must have been an unsociable folk in life to build a house\nin the woods, and they were an unsociable folk in death not to go to the\ncommon graveyard, where the dead folk were together, warm and kindly\nlying gently as in their beds....\n\nHe turned now from the loaning to the mountain-side, passing through the\nheather on a little path the sheep made with their sharp cloven hoofs.\nIn single file the sheep would go up the mountain-side, obedient as\nnuns, following the tinkle of the wether's bell, and they hunting a new\npasture they would crop like rabbits. Now was a stunted ash, now a\nrowan-tree with its red berries--_crann caorthainn_ they call it in\nGaidhlig,--and now was a holly bush would have red berries when all the\nbitter fruit of the rowan-tree was gone and the rolling sleets of winter\ncame over Antrim like a shroud. Everywhere about him now was the\nheather, the brown, the purple heather with the perfect little flower\nthat people called bells, all shades of red it was, and not often you\nwould come across a sprig of white heather, and white heather brought\nyou luck, just as much luck as a four-leaved shamrock brought, and\nfairer, more gallant luck.\n\nA very silent place a mountain was, wee Shane Campbell thought, not a\nlonely but a silent place. A lonely place was a place you might be\nafraid, as in a wood, but a mountain was only a place apart. Down in the\nfields were the big brooks, with the willow branches and great trout in\nthe streams; and fat cattle would low with a foolish cry like a man\nwouldn't be all there, and come home in the evenings to be milked,\nsatisfied and comfortable as a minister; wee calves shy as babies;\ndonkeys with the cross of Christ on their back; goats would butt you\nand you not looking; hens a-cackle, and cocks strutting like a\nmilitiaman and him back from the camp; quiet horses had the strength of\ntwenty men, and scampering colts had legs on them like withes. Up here\nwas nothing, but you never missed them.\n\nThe only thing to break the silence up here was the cry of an occasional\nbird, the plaintive call of the plover, the barking of an eagle, the\nnote of the curlew, a whinny as of a horse of Lilliput, the strange\nnoise a pheasant makes and it rising from the heather: _whir-r-r_, like\na piece of elastic snapping. Barring these you'd hear nothing at all.\nAnd barring a mountainy man or woman, and they cutting turf, you'd meet\nnothing unless it were the sheep.\n\nYou'd never hear the sheep, and you coming; you'd turn a wee bluff in\nthe hill, and there they were looking, a long, solemn, grayish-white\nline, with aloof, cold eyes. You could never faze them. They'd look at\nyou cool as anything, and \"What license have you to be here?\" you'd\nthink they were saying. Very stupid, but unco dignified, the sheep.\n\nBut up to the top of the mountain, where wee Shane was going, you'd find\nno sheep; too bare and rocky there. There'd be nothing there but a\npassing bird. On the top of the mountain was a little dark lake into\nwhich you couldn't see more than a foot, though they said the depth of\nit went down to the sea. There were no fish in it, people said, and that\nwas a queer thing, water without fish in it, wee Shane thought, like a\ncountry without inhabitants. In the sea were a power of fish, and in the\nrivers were salmon, long and thick as a man, and pike with snouts and\nominous teeth, and furry otters, about which there was great discussion\nas to whether they were fish or animal ... In the lake in the\nlowlands--Lochkewn, the Quiet Lake--were trout with red and gold and\nblack speckles; and perch with spiked fins; and dark roach were easy to\ncatch with a worm; and big gray bream were tasty as to bait, needing\npaste held by sheep's wool; and big eels would put a catch in your\nbreath.\n\nBut in the lake on the mountain-top were no fish at all, and that was a\nstrange thing ...\n\nThere was another eery thing about the mountain, and a thing wee Shane\nwas slightly afraid of. Oftentimes you'd be sitting by that lake, and\nsunlight all around you, and you'd turn to come down, and there'd be a\ncloud beneath you, a cloud that rolled in armfuls of wool that bound the\nmountain as by a ring; and the lonely call of a bird ... and you'd feel\nshut off from the kindly earth, as if you were on another planet maybe,\nor caught up into the air by some flying demon, and you knew the world\nwas spinning like a ball through the treeless fields of space.\n\nAnd what could a wee fellow do up there then but sit quiet and cry and\nbe terribly afraid? And your cry would be heard no more than the\nwhinnying of the curlew.... Or you might venture down through it, and\nthat was more terrible still, for the strange host of the air had their\ndomicile in the clouds, and there they held cruel congress, speaking in\ntheir speechless tongue, and out of the clouds they took shape and\nsubstance ... their cold, malevolent eyes, their smoky antennae of hands\n... and nothing to turn to for company, not even the moody badger or the\nunfriendly sheep. There was no going down. You must stay there by the\nlake, and even then the cloud might creep upward until it capped\nmountain and lake, and enveloped a wee fellow scared out of his wits....\n\nNevertheless, he was going to the top of that mountain, clouds or no\nclouds. For he had heard it said that the mirage of Portcausey was being\nseen again--the Devil's Troopers, and the _Oilean-gan-talamh-ar-bith_,\nthe Isle of No Land At All, and the Swinging City, and they were to be\nseen in the blue heat haze over the sea from the Mountain of Fionn....\n\nAnd wee Shane was going to see it, clouds or no clouds, host or no host\nof the air.\n\n\nSection 2\n\nHe had won half-ways up the mountain now, and from the brae of heather\nhe could see the glen stretch like a furrow to the sea. The Irish\nChannel they called it on the maps in school, but _Struth na Maoile_ it\nwas to every one in the country-side, the waters of Moyle. Very green,\nvery near, very gentle they seemed to-day, but often they roared like\ngiants in frenzy, fanned to fury by the winds of the nine glens, as a\nbellows livens a fire. But to-day it was like a lake, so gentle.... And\nthere was purple Scotland, hardly, you'd think, a stone's throw from the\nshore--the Mull of Cantyre, a resounding name, like a line in a poem. It\nwas from Mull that Moyle came, _maol_ in Gaidhlig, bald or bluff ... a\nmoyley was a cow without horns. The Lowlanders were coming into the Mull\nnow, and the Highlanders being pushed north to Argyll, and westward to\nthe islands, like Oran and Islay. He knew the Islay men, great rugged\nfishers with immense hands and their feet small as a girl's. They sang\nthe saddest sea-chanty in the world:\n\n  _'S tric mi sealltuinn o'n chnoc a's airde,\n  Dh' fheuch am faic mi fear a'bhata;\n  An tig thu'n aniugh, no'n tig thu amaireach,\n  'S mur tig thu idir, gur truagh a ta mi._\n\n\"From the highest hilltop I watched to see my boatman,\" went the sense\nof it. \"Will you come to-day or will you come to-morrow? And if you\nnever come--O God! help me!\"\n\nAnd there was a chorus to it that was like a keening for the dead:\n\n  _Fhir a' bhata na horo eile! Fhir a' bhata na horo eile!\n  Fhir a' bhata na horo eile! Mo shoraidh slan leat, fhir a' bhata!_\n\nMy heart's good-by to you, O man of the boat!\n\nBut nearer than Islay was their own Raghery--Rathlin Island the maps had\nit--he could see it now to the north. A strange little world of its own,\nwith great caves where the wind howled like a starving wolf, and the\nblack divers went into the water like a bullet. It was in the caves of\nRaghery that the Bruce took refuge, and it was there he saw the spider\nof Scots legend.... Rathlin was queer and queer.... There were many\nwomen with the second sight, it was told, and the men were very big,\nvery shy, very gentle, except when the drink was in them, and then they\nwould rage like the sea.\n\nA strange, mystical water, the Moyle, to have two isles in it like Islay\nof the pipers and Raghery of the black caves. It was over Moyle that\nColumkill went in his little coracle to be a hermit in Iona, the\ngentlest saint that Ireland ever knew. And it was over the Moyle that\nPatrick came, landing whilst the Druids turned their cursing stones and\ncould not prevail against him. And it was on the Moyle that the Children\nof Lir swam and they turned into three white swans, with their great\nwhite wings like sails and their black feet like sweeps.... And in the\nnight-time they sang a strange, sad music, and the echoes of it were\nstill in the nine glens....\n\nAnd northerly again were the pillars of the Giant's Causeway, blue-black\nagainst the sun. They were made so that the Finn MacCool, the champion\nof the giants, could take a running jump over to Scotland and he going\ndeer-hunting in the forests of Argyll. So the country folk said, but wee\nShane thought different, knew different. The Druids had made it for\ntheir own occult designs, the Druids, that terrible, powerful clan with\ntheir magic batons, and their sinister cursing-stones, and their long,\nwhite, benevolent beards....\n\nAnd there, green and well kept as a duke's garden, was the Royal Links\nof Portrush. And the Irish golfers said that it was harder than St.\nAndrew's in Scotland and better kept. There King James had played a game\nbefore he went down to the defeat of the Boyne Water.\n\n\"And if he golfed as well as he fought,\" Shane's Uncle Robin used to\nlaugh, \"they s'ould never have let him tee up a ball on the course!\"\n\n_Eigh!_ how wonderful it all was! wee Shane felt: Raghery and the waters\nof Moyle; Portrush and the Giant's Causeway; the nine glens with the\npurple heather, and the streams that sang as they cantered to the sea;\nthe crowing grouse and the whinnying curlew, and the eagles barking on\nthe cliffs; the trout that rose in the summer's evening, and the red\nberries of the rowan; the cold, clear lakes, and the braes where the\nblueberries grow. He could well understand the stories they told of\nNapper Tandy, and the great rebel in the gardens of Versailles. Napoleon\nhad found him weeping amid all that beauty.\n\n\"Don't be afraid, Napper Tandy. I shall keep my word and send General\nHoche to Ireland.\"\n\n\"It's not that, sir; it's not that.\" And Tandy could not keep the tears\nback. \"Och, County Antrim, it's far I'm from you now!\"\n\n\nSection 3\n\nHe had reached the cairn of round stones that marks the town land of\nDrimsleive, and was turning the brae when a voice called to him:\n\n\"Eh, wee fellow, is it mitching from school you are?\"\n\nAn old woman in a plaid shawl was coming slowly down the hillside. He\nrecognized her for Bridget Roe MacFarlane of Cushendhu, a cotter tenant\nof his Uncle Alan's.\n\n\"No, cummer,\" he told her; \"I'm not mitching. I got the day off.\"\n\n\"For God's sake! if it isn't wee Shane Campbell! And what are doing up\nthe mountain, wee Shane?\"\n\n\"Ah, just dandering.\"\n\n\"I was up mysel',\" she went on, \"to the top of it, because I heard tell\nthere was a cure for sore eyes in the bit lake on the top. Not that I\nput much store in such cures, but there's no use letting anything by. I\ngot a pair of specs from a peddling man of Ballymena,\" said she, \"but\nthey don't seem to do me much good. I'm queer and afeared about my\neyes, hinny. It would be a hard thing for me to go blind and none about\nthe wee bit house but mysel'.\"\n\n\"Ay! I should think it would be a terrible thing to be a dark person,\"\nwee Shane nodded.\n\n\"Och, it wouldn't be so bad if you were born that way, for you'd know no\ndifferent. And if you went blind and you young, there's things you could\ntake up to take the strain from your head like a man takes up piping.\nWhen you're old it's gey hard. If you're an old man itself, it's not so\nbad, for there'll always be a soft woman to take care of you. But if\nyou're an old cummer, without chick or child, it's hard, _agra vig_. My\nlittle love, it's hard.\"\n\n\"Maybe it's in your head, Bridget Roe. My Uncle Robin says there's a lot\nof sickness that's just in your head.\"\n\n\"I trust to my God so, and maybe your Uncle Robin's right, for there\ndoes be a lot in my head, and it going around like a spinning-wheel. I'm\na experienced woman, wee Shane, too experienced, and that's the trouble.\nYou've no' heard because you're too young and you would no' understand.\nI was away from here for twenty years,\" she said, \"for more nor twenty.\nAnd I knew a power of men in my time, big men, were needful of me. And\na power of trouble I raised, too, and it does be coming back to me and\nme in my old days.... But you'll be wanting to be getting on?\"\n\n\"Och, no, Bridgeen Roe; there's no hurry.\"\n\n\"It does me good to have a wee crack, the folk I see are so few ... Aye!\nThere was a power of trouble. There were two men killed themselves and\nfamilies broken up all by reason of me. I meant no harm, wee Shane, but\nit happened, and it does be troubling me in my old days. And I sit there\nafeared by the peat fire, and when I've thought too much on it, I get up\nand go to the half-door. And I look out on the Moyle, wee Shane, and I\nthink: that's been roaring since the first tick of time, and I see the\nstars so many of them, and the moon that never changed its shape or\nsize, and it comes to me that nothing matters in the long run, that the\nkilled men were no more nor caught trout, and the rent families no more\nnor birds' nests fallen from a tree.... None of us are big enough that\nanything we do matters.... And then another feeling comes on me, that\nGod is around, and that He'll be dreadful hard.... And a wee bit of luck\ncomes my way. The hens, maybe, are laying well, and there's a high price\non the eggs, and I think, sure He's the Kindly Man, after all.... But\nif my eyes leave me, Shane Beg, what will I do? Sure, I won't have the\nmoon or the stars or the waters of Moyle to put things in their place.\nAnd there'll be no luck about me, so as I'll know Himself is the\nUnforgiving Man.\"\n\n\"But some one will take care of you, Bridget Roe.\"\n\n\"And who, _agra_? 'Tis not me to go to the poorhouse, and take charity\nlike a cold potato. And my name is MacFarlane, wee Shane, and they're a\nclan that fights till it dies, that never gives in. And it isn't to the\nbig ones I knew I'd be writing for help.... Sure I see them now, what's\nleft alive of them, sitting by their firesides, figuring out their life,\nand tired with the puzzle of it; and then they'll remember me for an\ninstant, and a wee joy will come to them in the dim twilight. They'll\nremember as you'd remember an old song you hadn't rightly got the air\nof. But you knew it was sweet and there was a grand swing to it.... Aye,\nthey'll remember me, and they looking into the heart of the fire.... And\nyou wouldn't have me write them now and tell them I'm only an old\n_cailleach_ in a cabin on the mountain-side, and my eyes, that they'll\nremember, are dull like marbles.... You wouldn't understand, wee\nShane.... But I'm blethering too much about myself. And where is it you\nwere going, my little jo? Where is it?\"\n\n\"I heard tell the Dancers were to be seen from the mountain-top over the\nsea, and I thought maybe I'd go up and gi'e them a look, cummer ... just\na look.\"\n\n\"So you would, wee Shane, so you would. You wouldn't be your father's\nson or your uncles' nephew if you were to let a marvel like that pass\nby. It's after adventure you are, and you only four and ten years old.\n'T is early you begin, the Campbells of Cosnamara.\n\n\"But sure that isn't adventure, cummer, to be seeing the Dancers in the\nheat haze of the day. Adventures are robbers and fighting Indians and\nthings like in Sir Walter Scott.\"\n\n\"Oh, sure everything's adventure, hinny, every time you go looking for\nsomething queer and strange, and something with a fine shape and color\nto it. Adventure isn't in the quick fist and the nimble foot; it's in\nthe hungry heart and the itching mind. Isn't it myself that knows, that\nwas a wild and wilful girl, and went out into the world for more nor\ntwenty years, and came back the like of an old bitch fox, harried by\nhunting, and looking for and mindful of the burrow where she was\nthrown?... As we're made, we're made, wee fellow; you're either a\nsalmon that hungers for the sea, or a cunning old trout that kens its\nown pool and is content.... Adventures! Hech aye!\"\n\n\"Well, I hope your eyes get better, cummer. I do so.\"\n\n\"I know you mean it, Shaneen Beg, and maybe your wish will help them,\nmaybe it will.\"\n\n\"Well, I'll be going on my way, Bridget Roe.\"\n\n\"And I'll be finishing mines, wee Shane Campbell. And I hope to my God\nyou're better off at the end nor me--me that once talked to earls and\nbarons, and now clucks to a wheen o' hens; me that once had my coach and\npair, and now have only an ass with a creel o' turf; and no care of\nmoney once on me, and now all I have is my spinning-wheel, and the flax\nnot what it used to be, but getting coarser. And my eyes going out, that\nwere the delight of many ... I hope you're better off nor me at the end\nof the hard and dusty road, wee Shane. I hope to my God so....\"\n\n\nSection 4\n\nHe thought hard of what the cummer of Cushendhu had said about his\nfamily, and he on the last leg of the mountain. That he was his\nfather's son puzzled him more than that he was his uncles' nephew, for\nthere was little mention of his father in the house. At the dead man's\nname his prim Huguenot mother from Nantes pursed her mouth, and in her\npresence even his uncles were uncomfortable, those great, gallant men.\nAll he knew was that his father, Colquitto Campbell, had been a great\nGaelic poet, and that his father and mother had not quite been good\nfriends. Once his Uncle Robin had stopped before a ballad-singer in\nBallycastle when the man was striking up a tune:\n\n  On the deck of this lonely ship to America bound,\n  A husk in my throat and a mist of tears in my eyes--\n\nHis Uncle Robin had given the man a guinea.\n\n\"Why for did you give the singing man a golden piece, Uncle Robin?\"\n\n\"For the sake of an old song, laddie, an old and sad song.... A song\nyour father made.... It was like seeing his ghost....\"\n\n\"But my father, Uncle Robin--\"\n\n\"Your father was the heart of corn, wee Shane, for all they say against\nhim.... I never knew a higher, cleaner heart, but he was easy\ndiscourag't.... Aye, easy thrown down and easy led away.... I was fond\nof him.... Am ... always, and no matter.... However ... shall we go and\nsee the racing boats, wee fellow?\"\n\nAnd that was all he ever got from Uncle Robin. But he knew some of his\nfather's songs that were sung in the country-side ...\n\n  _Is truagh, a ghradh, gan me agas thu im Bla chliath!\n  No air an traigh bhain an ait nach robh duine riamh,\n  Seachd oidhche, seachd la, gan tamh, gan chodal, gan bhiadh,\n  Ach thusa bhi 'm ghraidh's lamh geal thardam gu fial!_\n\n\"O God! my loved one, that you and I were in Dublin town! Or on a white\nstrand, where no foot ever touched before. Day in, night in, without\nfood or sleep, what mattered it? But you to be loving me and your white\narm around me so generously!\"\n\nHe couldn't understand the song, though the lilt of the words captured\nhim. What should people accept being without food or sleep? And what\ngood was a white arm generously around one? However, that was love, and\nit was a mystery.... But that song could not have been to his mother. He\ncould not imagine her being generous with even a white arm. And none\nwould want to be with her on a strand without food or sleep; that he\ninstinctively felt. She was a high, proud cliff, stern and proud and\nbeautiful, and that song was a song of May-time and the green\nrushes....\n\nAnd other songs of his father's were sung: \"Maidne Fhoghmhair--Autumn\nMornings,\" and \"In Uir-chill an Chreagain--In the Green Graveyard of\nCreggan....\"\n\nA queer thing that all that should be left of his father was a chill\nsilence and a song a man might raise at the rising of the moon....\n\nSilent he was in his grave, dumb as a stone, and all his uncles were\nsilent, too, barring the little smile at the corners of their mouths,\nthat was but the murmuring of the soul.... There were paintings of them\nall and they young in the house, their high heads, their hawks' eyes,\nAlan and Robin and Mungo.... And Mungo, too, was dead with Wellington in\nthe Peninsula. He and three of his men were all left of the Antrim\ncompany. \"Christ! have I lost this fight, too?\" He laughed and a French\nball took him in the gullet. \"Be damned to that!\" He coughed. \"He might\nhave got me in a cleaner place!\" And that was the end of Mungo....\n\nAnd Alan had gone with Sir John Franklin to the polar seas, and come\nback with the twisted grin. \"'T was a grand thing you did, Alan, to live\nthrough and come back from the wasted lands.\" \"'T was a grand thing they\ndid, to find the channel o' trade. But me, I went to find the north\npole, with the white bear by the side of it, like you see in the\nstory-books. And I never got within the length of Ireland o' 't! Trade,\naye; but what's trade to me? It's a unco place, the world!\"\n\nHis father he could imagine: \"Poor Colquitto Campbell! He wanted to bark\nlike an eagle, and he made a wee sweet sound, like a canary-bird! Ah,\nwell, give the bottle the sunwise turn, man o' the house, and come\ncloser to me, a _bheilin tana nan bpog_, O slender mouth of the kisses!\"\nHis father, wee Shane thought, must have worn the twisted grin, too.\n\nHe knew what the twisted grin meant. It meant defeat. He had seen it on\nhis Uncle Alan's face when he lost the championship of Ireland on the\ngolf links of Portrush. And that morning he had been so confident! \"'T\nis the grand golf I'll play the day, and the life tingling in my\nfinger-tips!\" And great golf he did play, with his ripping passionate\nshots, but a thirty-foot putt on the home green beat him. All through\nthe match his face had been dour, but now came the outstretched hand and\nthe smile at the corner of the mouth:\n\n\"Congratulations, sir! 'T is yourself has the grand eye for the hard\nputt on the tricky green!\"\n\nThe wee grin meant that Alan had been beaten.\n\nAnd Uncle Robin, too, the wisest and oldest of them all, who had been to\nArabia and had been all through Europe and was Goethe's friend, he had\nthe twisted grin of the beaten man. Only occasionally you could get past\nthe grin of Uncle Robin, as he had gotten past it the day Uncle Robin\nhad spoken of his brother, Shane's father. And sometimes when a great\nhush was on the mountains and the Moyle was silent, Uncle Robin would\nmurmer a verse of his great poet friend's:\n\n  Ueber allen Gipfeln\n  Ist Ruh,\n  In allen Wipfeln\n  Spuerest du\n  Kaum einen Hauch;\n  Die Voegelein schweigen im Walde.\n  Warte nur, balde\n  Ruhest du auch.\n\nThe sharp u's and heavy gutturals were so like Gaidhlig, it seemed queer\nwee Shane could not understand the poem; but Uncle Robin translated it\ninto Gaidhlig:\n\n  _Os cionn na morbheanna\n  Ta sith_--\n\nAnd the melody of it was like the plucking of a harper's strings. So\nmuch in so little, and every note counted, and the last line like a dim\nquaint bar:\n\n_Beidh sith agad fein!_ \"You will rest, too!\"\n\nA queer thing, the men who were beaten and smiled. A queer thing the men\nwho, beaten, were more gallant than the winners. A queer thing for the\ncummer of Cushendhu to say, she who was so wise after the hot\nfoolishness of youth, that he was his uncles' nephew and his father's\nson. A queer thing that. A queer, dark, and secret thing.\n\n\nSection 5\n\nThe memory of his Uncle Robin stuck in his mind and he going up the\nmountain. His Uncle Robin knew all there was to be known in the world,\nthe immense learned man. When he was spoken to of anything strange, he\nhad always an explanation for it. When the mirage off Portrush was\nmentioned, he could talk at length of strange African mirages that the\ntravelers see in the desert at the close of day, oases and palm-trees\nand minarets, so you would think you were near to a town or a green\npasture and you miles and miles away. And there was a sight to be seen\noff Sicily that the ignorant Italian people thought was the work of\nMorgan le Fay. And in the Alps was a horror men spoke of and called the\nSpecter of the Brocken.\n\nAll these strange occurrences were as simple as the alphabet to Uncle\nRobin. He would explain it as a sight reflected on the cloud and thrown\non a sea of mist or a desert as on a screen, using difficult words, like\n\"refraction,\" and words from Euclid, like \"angles.\" But Uncle Alan would\nobject, Uncle Alan mistrusting difficult words and words from Euclid.\nAlan would raise his head from splicing a fishing-rod or cleaning the\nlock of a gun or polishing a snaffle:\n\n\"You were ay the one for explanations, Robin. Maybe you've got an\nexplanation for the gift?\" By the gift Uncle Alan meant the second\nsight.\n\n\"Ah, sure; 't is only mind reading and sympathy.\"\n\n\"O my God! Now listen, Robin. You ken when you dragged me from the\nhorse-show the last time we were in Dublin, to the library of the\nWhat-you-may-call-him--Archaeological Society or so'thin'. You ken the\nbook you showed me about Antrim, and what was seen off the cliffs one\ntime. There was a great black arm in the air, and a hand to the wrist\nof it, and to the shoulder a crosspiece with a ring, like one end of an\nanchor. And that disappeared. And then immediately there showed a ship,\nwith the masts and sails and tackles and men, and it sailed stern\nforemost and it sank stern foremost, all in the red sky. And then there\nwas a fort with a castle on the top of it and there were fire and smoke\ncoming out of it, as if a grand fight was on. And the fort divided into\ntwo ships, that chased each other, and then sank. Then there was a\nchariot with two horses, and chasing that was a strange thing like a\nserpent, a snake's head at one end, and a bulk at the other like a\nsnail's house. And it gained on the chariot and gave it a blow. And out\nof the chariot came a bull, and after it came a dog, and the bull and\nthe dog fought as in a gaming-pit. And then suddenly all was clear, no\ncloud or mist or anything in the northern air. Am I right or am n't I?\nWasn't that in the book, Robin More?\"\n\n\"It was.\"\n\n\"And now, Robin, my man, wasn't that signed by respectable people: Mr.\nAllye, a minister, and a Lieutenant Dunsterville and a Lieutenant Dwine\nand Mr. Bates and twelve others, all of whom saw it near or around the\ntime of the Boyne Water? Wasn't it signed by the decent people?\"\n\n\"It was.\"\n\n\"And what explanation have you got for that, you and your master of arts\nof Trinity College!\"\n\n\"They were daft--gone in the head. Daft or drunk.\"\n\n\"My song! And maybe John was daft when he saw the vision of Patmos!\"\n\n\"I would no' be surprised.\"\n\n\"Na, Robin More; you would not be surprised if you saw a trout that\ncantered or a horse that flew. You'd have an explanation. You're the\nqueer hard man to live with, Robin, with your explanations.\"\n\nWillie John Boyd, the servant boy, removed his cutty pipe and hazarded a\nsuggestion.\n\n\"Queer things happened in the auld days.\"\n\n\"If there were queerer things nor you in the auld days,\" Alan laughed,\n\"it must have been like a circus.\"\n\nBut mightn't they both be right? wee Shane thought, and he trudging up\nthe mountain-side. His Uncle Alan knew an awful lot. There was none\ncould coax a trout from a glass-clear pool with a dry fly like Alan\nCampbell. He knew the weather, when it would storm and when it would\nclear, and from what point the wind would blow to-morrow. He could nurse\nalong the difficult flax and knew the lair of the otter and had a great\neye for hunting fox and a better eye for a horse than a Gipsy. Might\nthere not be things in nature, as he said, that none knew of? And\nmightn't there be explanations for them, as Uncle Robin, who had read\nevery book, claimed there were? Mightn't they both be right, who thought\neach other wrong, and they arguing by the red fire, fighting and\nsnarling like dogs and loving each other with the strange soft love of\nlovers when the trees are a-rustle and the moon high?\n\n\nSection 6\n\nHe had thought to come up to the top of the mountain where the cairn\nwas, and the dark and deepest lake, and to sit down in the heather and\nwait half an hour maybe while the curlew called, and then have Dancing\nTown take form and color before his eyes, hold it until every detail was\nvisible, and then fade gently out as twilight fades into night. He had\nthought to be prepared and receptive.\n\nBut suddenly it was upon him, in the air, over the waters of Moyle....\n\nA sweep of fear ran over him, and he grew cold, so strange it was, so\nagainst nature. Clear and high, as in some old print, and white and\ngreen, the town and shore came to him. The May afternoon was in it, hot\nand golden, but the town itself was in morning sunlight. A clutter of\ngreat houses and little houses, all white, a great church, and a squat\ndun fort, and about it and in it were green spaces and palm-trees that\nswayed to a ghostly breeze. And the green ran down to a white beach, and\non the beach foamy waves curled like a man's beard. And in the air the\ntown quivered and danced, as imaged trees seem to dance on running\nwater....\n\nOn one side was Ireland, and _on one_ side was Scotland, and high in the\nair between them was Dancing Town....\n\nNo one was in the streets that wee Shane could see, and yet the town was\nlifeful, some tropical city where the green jalousies were closed in the\nheat of the midday sun, and where no one was on the streets, barring\nsome unseen old beggar or peddling woman drowsing in the shade. The town\nwas sleeping not with the sleep of Scotland, that is the sleep of dead\nmajestic, melancholy kings, nor with the sleep of Ireland, that is\ntired and harassed and old. It was not as lonely as sleeping lakes are\nwhere the bittern booms like a drum.... It slept as a child sleeps, lips\napart and chubby fingers uncurled, and happy.... And all the time it\nquivered in the clear air....\n\nIn the morning, wee Shane thought, it woke to bright happiness, the\ngreen parrakeets chattered, the monkeys whistled, the lizards basked in\nthe sun. And the generation of the town came out and gossiped and worked\nmerrily, until the heat of the sun began to strike with the strokes of a\nmallet, and then they went into the cool, dark houses and slept as\nchildren sleep. And then came blue twilight, and lamps were lit in the\ngreen spaces, and into the odorous night would come the golden rounded\nwomen with smiles like honey, and the graceful feline men.... A woman's\nlaughter, a man's song.... And the moon rising on tropic seas, while a\nguitar hummed with a deep vibrant note.... And the perfume of strange\ntropic trees....\n\nBut meantime the town danced in the clear air.... And--\n\n\"It's gone!\" said wee Shane.\n\nOne moment it was there, and the next there were only Ireland and\nScotland and the waters of Moyle, and a ship going drowsily for the\nClyde.\n\nAnd for a long time he waited, thinking Dancing Town might come again.\nBut it did not come. The schooner off the Mull lay over, and the Moyle\nawoke. A breeze rambled up the mountain, and the heather tinkled its\nstrange dry tinkle. And afar off a curlew called, and a grouse crowed in\ndefiance.\n\nThe moment of magic was by, and wee Shane went down the mountain.\n\n\nSection 7\n\nAs he went down the mountain he tried to puzzle out the why and\nwherefore of Dancing Town.\n\nOf course there were things you could not explain, like the banshee; or\nthe Naked Hangman, who strides through the valleys on midsummer's eve\nwith his gallows under his arm; or the Death Coach, with its headless\nhorses and its headless driver. There was no use bringing these matters\nup to Uncle Robin. Uncle Robin would only laugh and shout: \"Havers,\nbairn! Wha's been filling your wee head with nonsense?\" But you could no\nmore deny their existence than you could that of Apollyon, whom you read\nabout in \"Pilgrim's Progress,\" and who wandered up and down the world\nand to and fro in it; or of the fairies, whose sweet little piping many\nheard at night as they passed the forts of the little people; or of the\ntiny cobbling leprechawns, who knew where the Danes had hid their store\nof gold in crocks such as hold butter.... Of these there was no\nexplanation but the Act of God. And Uncle Robin was queer. He put no\nstore in the Act of God.\n\n[Illustration]\n\nNow, if it had been an angel he had seen in the high air, it would have\nbeen the Act--or the banshee, and her crooning and keening by the\nriverside, with her white cloak, her red, burnished hair.... But it was\nan island he had seen, a dancing town, with his own hard wee Scots-Irish\neyes. And that was not an Act of God; it was a fact, and so outside his\nUncle Alan's bailiwick and within his Uncle Robin's. His Uncle Robin\nwould say it was the reflected image of some place in the world. Aye,\nhe'd take his Uncle Robin's word for that. But where was it? Surely, as\nyet, it was undiscovered. It had the quiet of a June evening, that land\nhad, and a grand shimmering beauty.... And if it was known where it was,\nwouldn't the mountainy folk be leaving their cabins, and the strong\nfarmers their plowed lands, and the whining tinkers be hoofing the road\nfor it? If it was known where that land was....\n\nIt occurred to him it must have been that land his father meant and he\nwriting his poem of the Green Graveyard of Creggan. While he was\nsleeping under the weeping yew-trees the young queen had touched the\nsleeping poet on the shoulder.\n\n\"_A shiolaigh charthannaigh_,\" she said, \"O kindly kinsman, _na\ncaithtear thusa ins na nealtaibh broin_, let you not be thrown under the\nclouds of sorrow! _Acht eirigh in do sheasamh_, but rise in your\nstanding, _agas gluais liomsa siar' sa' rod_, and travel with me\nwestward in the road. _Go Tir Dheas na Meala_, to the shimmering land of\nhoney where the foreigner has not the sway. And you will find pleasantry\nin white halls persuading me to the strains of music.\"\n\nSurely his father, too, had seen Dancing Town!\n\nAnd it was an old story that Oisin had found it, when he rode with the\nprincess over the waves on a white horse whose hoofs never touched\nwater, and he abode with her in _Tir nan Og_, in the Land of Them Who\nare Young, for a thousand years or more, until the great homesickness\nfor Ireland took him, that takes the strongest, and he came for a visit\non the white horse; but the girths of the saddle broke, and he fell to\nthe ground, and the horse flew away. And he who had been strong and\nyoung and beautiful became old and bald and blind, and Patrick of the\nBells and Crosses took him, and put him with the groaning penitents, who\nbeat their breasts under the fear of hell. And he, who had known Tir nan\nOg and the Silver Woman, was a drooling ancient with a wee lad to lead\nhim.... But that was just a winter's tale with no sense to it.\n\nBut there were other things in books that had the ring of truth to them.\nThere was the voyage of Maeldun, who had set out in his coracle, and\nvisited strange islands. The Island of Huge Ants was one, and wee Shane\nhad seen in his geography book pictures of armadillos, and he shrewdly\nsurmised that Maeldun had been to South America. And there was the\nIsland of Red-Hot Animals, but that was a poser. Still and all, the\nrhinoceros had armor like an old knight's, and that would surely get\nred-hot under the suns of the equator. It would explain, too, why the\nrhinoceros favored the water, like a cow in July.... Sure that was it:\nMaeldun had been to Africa. And Maeldun, too, had found the Fortunate\nIsle. Brendan, too, had known it. Wasn't it in old charts--St. Brendan's\nIsle? He said he found it, and surely a saint of God wouldn't lie....\n\nOch, it was there somewhere, but people were different from what they\nwere in the ancient days. They didn't bother. If they had told his\nfather about it, sure all Colquitto would have done was to call for pen\nand paper.\n\n\"_Mo bhron air an fhairrge_,\" he would have written: \"My grief on the\nsea--how it comes between me and the land where my mind might be easy--\"\nAnd then he'd have lain back and chanted it. \"'_Avourneen_, did you ever\nin all your life hear a poem as good as my poem? Sure old Homer's\njealous in the black clouds. Was there ever a Greek poet the equal of a\nGaelic one? _Anois, teacht an Earraigh_--now the moment spring comes in,\n't is I will hoist sail, _inneosad mo sheol_....\"\n\nAnd Alan Donn might have started to find it, but at the first golf links\nhe'd stop, \"to take the conceit out of the local people, and to give\nthem something to talk of, and they old men,\" or to match his coursing\ngreyhound against any dog in the world for a ten-pound note, or to\ndeluther some red-cheeked likely woman....\n\nAnd Uncle Robin might hear of it, and he'd sit down and write a book,\nsaying where it probably was, and how you might get there, and what the\npeople were like, and whom they were probably descended from.... And\nthe book would be in all the libraries of the world, and people would be\nwriting him telling him what a great head was on him, and he'd mutter:\n\"Nonsense! Nonsense! All nonsense!\" and stroke his great red beard....\n\nBut wouldn't it be the funny thing, the queer and funny thing, if he\nhimself, wee Shane Campbell, were to go out and discover that island,\nand to own it, and to have it marked in the maps and charts, \"Wee Shane\nCampbell's Island,\" for all to read and see?...\n\n\"Decent wee fellow, is it about here somewhere the house of the McFees?\"\n\nShane had turned into the main road that ran along the sea-shore on the\nway homeward when the voice hailed him. It was a great black-bearded\nman, sitting on the ditch, holding his shoes in his hand. His face was\ntanned to mahogany, and in his ears were little gold rings. He wore\nclothes that were obviously new, obviously uncomfortable.\n\n\"If you keep on the road about a half a mile and then turn to the left,\nand keep on there until you come to a loaning near a well with a\nhawthorn-bush couching over it, and turn to the left down that loaning,\nyou'll come to it. It's a wee thatched house, needing a coat of\nwhitewash. It's got a byre with a slate roof, and a rowan-tree near it.\nYou canna' miss it.\"\n\n\"Now isn't that the queer thing,\" the big man said, \"me that thought I\nknew every art and part of this country, and that could find my way in\nthe dark from Java Head to Poplar Parish, can't remember the place where\nI was born and reared? Forty years of traveling on the main ocean and\nthinking long for this place, and now when I come back I know no more\nabout it than a fish does of dry land.\" He stood up painfully. \"And me\nthat thought I would come back leaping like a hare am now killed\nentirely with the soreness of my feet.\"\n\n\"You're not accustomed to walking, then, honest man?\"\n\n\"'Deed, and you may say I'm not, decent wee fellow. I'm a sailorman, and\naboard ship there's very little use for the feet. You've got to be quick\nas a fish with the hands, and have great strength in the arms of you.\nAnd you must have toes to grip, and thighs to brace you against the\nheeling timbers. But to be walking somewhere for long, hitting the road\nwith your feet like you'd be hitting a wall with your head, it's\nunnatural to a sailing man. A half a mile, did you say?\"\n\n\"Honest man,\" said wee Shane, troubled, \"are you looking for any one in\nthe house of the McFees?\"\n\n\"For a woman that bore me and put me to her breast. An old woman now,\ndecent wee fellow.\"\n\n\"You'll no' find her, honest man.\"\n\n\"She's dead?\"\n\n\"I saw her with the pennies on her eyes not two months gone.\"\n\n\"So my mother's dead,\" said the big man. \"So my mother's dead. Ah, well,\nall her troubles are over. It's forty years since I saw her, and she the\nstrapping woman. And in forty years she must have had a power of\ntrouble.\"\n\n\"She looked unco peaceful, honest man.\"\n\n\"The dead are always peaceful, decent wee fellow. So my mother's dead.\nWell, that alters things.\"\n\n\"You'll be staying at home then, honest man?\"\n\n\"I'll be going back to sea, decent wee fellow. I had intended to stay at\nhome and be with the old woman in her last days, the like of a pilot\nthat brings a ship in, as you might say. But it would have been queer\nand hard. Herself, now, had no word of English?\"\n\n\"Old Annapla McFee spoke only the Gaidhlig.\"\n\n\"And the Gaidhlig is gone from me, as the flower goes from the\nfruit-tree. And there could have been little conversation betwixt us,\nshe remembering fairs and dances and patterns in the Gaidhlig, and me\nthinking of strange foreign ports in the English tongue. Poor company\nI'd have been for an old woman and she making her last mooring. I'd have\nbeen little assistance. Forty years between us--strange ports and deep\nsoundings. Oh, we'd have been making strange.\"\n\n\"Ah, maybe not, honest man.\"\n\n\"How could it have been any other way, decent wee lad? She'd have been\nthe strange, pitiful old cummer to me, who minded her the strapping\nwoman, and I'd have been a queer bearded man to her, who minded me only\nas a wee fellow, the terror of the glen. People change every day, and\nthere's a lot of change in forty years.\n\n\"And, besides, it would have been gey hard on me, wee lad. The grape and\nspade would be clumsy to my hands, there being no life to them after the\nswinging spars. And my fingers, used to splicing rope, would not have\nthe touch for milking a cow. And I'd feel lost, wee fellow, some day and\nme plowing a field, to see a fine ship on the waters, out of Glasgow\nport for the Plate maybe, and to think of it off the Brazils, and the\npampero coming quick as a thrown knife, and me not aboard to help\nshorten sail or take a trick at the wheel. And it might have made me\nugly toward the old woman. And I wouldn't have had that at all, at\nall.... But she's finished the voyage, poor cummer.... And it's a high\nship and a capstan shanty for me again ... all's well....\"\n\n\"It's a wonder, honest man, you wouldn't stay on land at peace and you\nforty years at sea.\"\n\n\"Well, it's a queer thing, decent wee fellow, but once you get the salt\nwater in your blood you're gone. A queer itching is in your veins. It's\nlike a disease. It is so. It spoils you for the fire on winter nights\nand for the hay-fields in the month o' June. And it puts a great bar\nbetween you and the folk o' dry land, such as there is between a\nfighting man and a cowardly fellow. It's the salt in the blood, I think;\nbut you'd have to ask a doctor about that.\n\n\"I'm not saying it's a good life. It's a dog's life. It is so. And when\nyou're at sea you say: 'Wasn't I the fool to ever leave dry land; and if\nI get back and get a job,' says you, 'you'll never see me leave it\nagain. It's a wee farm for me,' you'll say. And then somehow you'll find\nyourself back aboard ship. And you'll be off the Horn, up aloft,\nfighting a sail like you'd fight a man for your life, or you'll be in\nthe horse latitudes, as they call them, and no breeze stirring, and not\na damned thing to do but holystone decks, the like of an old pauper that\ndoes be scrubbing a poorhouse floor. And you say: 'Sure I'd rather be a\ntinker traveling the roads, with his ass and cart and dog and woman, nor\na galley-slave to this bastard of a mate that has no more feeling for a\npoor sailorman nor a hound has for a rabbit. It's a dog's life,' you\nsay, 'and when we make port I'm finished.'\n\n\"But you make port and you stay awhile, and you find that the woman\nyou've been thinking of as Queen of Sheba is no more nor a common drab.\nAnd the publican you thought of as the grand generous fellow has no more\nuse for you and your bit silver gone. It's a queer thing, but they on\nland think of nothing but money. And one day you think, and the woman\nbeside you is pastier nor dough, and the man of the public house is no\nmore nor a cheap trickster, and you're listening to the conversation of\nthe timid urban people, and the house you're in is filthier nor a pig's\nsty. And you say: 'Is this me that minds the golden women of the\nislands, and they with red flowers in their hair? Is this me that fought\nside by side with good shipmates in Callao? Am I listening to the\nchatter of these mild people, me that's heard grand stories in the\nforecastle of how this man was marooned in the Bahamas, and that man was\nmarried to a Maori queen, by God? Me, the hero that dowsed skysails, and\nthey cracking like guns. Is this lousy room a place for me that's used\nto a ship as clean as a cat from stem to stern?' And you stand up\nbravely, and you look the man of the public house square in the shifty\neyes, and you say: 'Listen, bastard! Do you ken e'er a master wants a\nsailing man? A sailor as knows his trade, crafty in trouble, and a\nwildcat in danger, and as peaceful as a hare in the long grass?' And\nyou're off again on the old trade and the old road, where the next port\nis the best port, and the morrow is a braver day.... So it's so long,\ndecent wee fellow! I'm off on it again. It's a dog's life, that's what\nit is, the life of a sailing man. But you couldn't change. I suppose\nit's the salt in the blood.\"\n\n\"You're off, honest man?\"\n\n\"Aye, I'm off, wee fellow. And thank you kindly for what you told me,\nand for telling me especially the old woman looked so peaceful and her\nwith the pennies on her eyes.\"\n\n\"But aren't you going up to see the house?\"\n\n\"I don't think I will, wee lad. I've had a picture in my mind for forty\nyears of the big house was in it, and the coolth of the well. And maybe\nit isn't so at all. I'd rather not know the difference. I'll keep my\npicture.\"\n\n\"But the house is yours,\" wee Shane urged him. \"You're not going to\nleave it as it is. Aren't you going to sell it and take the money?\"\n\n\"Och, to hell with that! I've no time,\" said the sailing man, and he\nlimped painfully back down the road.\n\n\nSection 8\n\nHis Uncle Robin had gone off to discuss with some Belfast crony the\nstrange things he used to discuss, like the origin of the Round Tower of\nIreland or the cryptic dialect of the Gaelic masons or whether the Scots\ncame to Scotland from Ireland or to Ireland from Scotland, all very\nimportant for a member of the Royal Irish Academy. And his mother had\ngone off shopping to buy linen for the house at Cushendhu, poplin for\ndresses, delft from Holland for the kitchen and glass from Waterford for\nthe sideboard in the dining-room. And because he was to go to the\nboarding-school that night and thereafter would be harsh discipline,\nand because his Uncle Robin had known he was on the point of crying, he\nhad been allowed to wander around Belfast by himself for a few hours\nwith a silver shilling in his pocket. And wee Shane had made for the\nquays....\n\nThe four of them had sat in a cold, precise room that morning, his Uncle\nRobin, his mother, wee Shane, and the principal, a fat, gray-eyed,\ninsincere Southerner, with a belly like a Chinese god's, dewlaps like a\nhunting hound's, cold, stubby, and very clean hands, and a gown that\ngave him a grotesque dignity. And he had eyed wee Shane unctuously. And\nwee Shane did not like fat, unctuous men. He liked them lean and active,\nas glensmen are.\n\nAnd the principal had spoken in stilted French to his mother, who had\nresponded in French that cracked like a whip. And the principal had\nlicked the ground before Uncle Robin. It was \"Yes, Dr. Campbell!\" And,\n\"No, Dr. Campbell!\" where the meanest glensman would have said \"Aye,\nmaybe you're right, Robin More,\" or, \"Na, na, you're out there, Robin\nCampbell.\"\n\n\"The old hypocrite!\" It was the only word wee Shane could describe the\nmaster by, a favorite word of his Uncle Alan's.\n\nAnd in the corridors he had met some of the scholars, white-faced\nfellows; and the masters--they had mean eyes, like the eyes of badgers.\n\n\"I dinna want to go!\" He blurted out on the quays of Belfast.\n\n\"Where dinna you want to go, wee laddie?\" A black, curly-headed man with\ngray eyes and a laugh like a girl's stopped short. He had blue clothes\nand brass buttons and stepped lightly as a cat.\n\n\"I dinna want to go to school.\"\n\n\"Sure, all wee caddies go to school.\"\n\n\"I ken that. But I don't want to go to school with a bunch of whey-faced\ngets, and masters lean and mean as rats, and a principal puffed out like\na setting hen.\"\n\n\"Oh, for God's sake! is that the way you feel about it? Laddie, you\ndon't talk like a townsman. Where are you from?\"\n\n\"I'm from the Glens of Antrim. From Cushendhu.\"\n\n\"I'm a Raghery man myself. _Tha an Gaidhlig agad?_\n\n\"_Tha, go direach!_\"\n\n\"So you've got the Gaidhlig too? Who are your people, wee laddie?\"\n\n\"I'm a Campbell of Cushendhu.\"\n\n\"For God's sake! you're no' a relation of Alan Campbell's, wha sailed\nwith Sir John Franklin for the pole?\"\n\n\"I'm his nephew.\"\n\n\"I've sailed under your Uncle Alan. He's the heart o' corn. And so\nthey're going to make a scholar out of you, like your Uncle Robin. Oh,\nwell, oh, well. Would you like to come around with me and see the\nships?\"\n\n\"I'd like fine to see the ships.\"\n\n\"You'll see all manner of ships here. Square-riggers, fore-and-afters,\nhermaphrodites. You'll see Indiamen and packets from Boston. You'll see\nships that do be going to Germany, and some for the Mediterranean ports.\nYou'll see a whaler that's put in for repairs. You'll see fighting\nships. You'll see fishers of the Dogger Banks, and boats that go to\nNewfoundland, where the cod do feed. All manner of sloops and schooners,\nbarkantines and brigs, but the bonniest of them all lies off\nCarrickfergus.\"\n\n\"And who's she, Raghery man?\"\n\n\"The _Antrim Maid_ is her nomination.\"\n\n\"And do you sail her?\"\n\n\"I sail in her, laddie. Sail and sail in her. Mine from truck to keelson\nshe is, and I'm master of her. Father and mother and brother to her, and\nhusband, too. I'm proud of her.\" The Rathliner laughed. \"You may\nnotice.\"\n\n\"And why for shouldn't you be? She must be the grand boat surely, man\nwho sailed with my Uncle Alan.\"\n\n\nSection 9\n\n\"Raghery man, you who've sailed the high seas and the low seas, did you\never put into an island that has great coolth to it and great sunshine,\na town quiet as a mouse, a strip of sand like silver, the waves turning\nwith a curl and chime?\"\n\n\"Where did you hear tell of that island, wee laddie? Was it in the books\nyou do be reading at school?\"\n\n\"I saw it, and it dancing in the sun. From Slievenambanderg I saw it,\nand it over the waters of Moyle.\"\n\nThe Rathliner sat on a mooring bitt on the quay and filled his pipe.\n\n\"I ken that island,\" he said. \"I ken it well.\"\n\n\"And what name is on it, Raghery man?\"\n\n\"The name that's on it is Fiddlers' Green.\"\n\n\"Were you ever there, Raghery man?\" There was a sinking in wee Shane's\nheart.\n\n\"I was never there, laddie, never there. Oftentimes I thought I'd\nraised it, but it was never there, wee laddie, never there. There's men\nas says they've been there, but I could hardly believe them, though\nthere's queer things past belief on the sea. There's a sea called\nSargasso, and if I told you half the things about it, you'd think me\ndaft. And there's the ghost of ships at sea, and that's past thinking.\nAnd there's the great serpent, that I've seen with my own eyes....\n\n\"Aye, Fiddlers' Green! Where is it, and how do you get there? The\nsailormen would give all their years to know.\"\n\n\"Why for do they call it Fiddlers' Green?\"\n\n\"It's Fiddlers' Green, laddie, because it's the place you come to at the\ncool of the day, when the bats are out, and the cummers put by their\nspinning. And there's nou't there but sport and music. A lawn like a\ngolf green, drink that is not ugly, women would wander with you on to\nthe heather when the moon's rising, and never a thought in their mind of\nthe money in your pocket, but their eyes melting at you, and they\nthinking you're the champion hero of the world.... And all the fiddlers\nfiddling the finest of dance music: hornpipes like 'The Birds among the\nTrees' and 'The Green Fields of America'; reels like 'The Swallow-tail\nCoat' and 'The Wind that Shakes the Barley'; slip-jigs would make a\ncripple agile as a hare.... And you go asleep with no mate to wake you\nin a blow, but the sound of an old piper crooning to you as a cummer\ncroons. And the birds will wake you with their douce singing.... Aye,\nFiddlers' Green....\"\n\nAnd they were silent for a minute in the soft Ulster sunshine.\n\n\"Would you have any use for a lad like myself aboard your ship, Raghery\nman?\"\n\n\"Och, sure, what would you do with the sea, wee fellow?\"\n\n\"I ken it well already, Raghery man. And I'm no clumsy in a boat. I can\nsail a sloop with any man. On a reach or full and by, I'll keep her\nthere. With the breeze biting her weather bow, I'll hold her snout into\nit. Or with the wind behind me, I'll ride her like you'd canter a\nhorse.\"\n\n\"I might take you to learn you seamanship and navigation, but you'd be\nno use as a sailor, wee laddie, and it's not for a Campbell to be a\ncabin-boy.\"\n\n\"Take me to learn the trade, then. Take me now.\"\n\n\"I'd like fine, wee fellow, but I couldn't do it. You might be cut out\nfor a scholar for all you think you're not. Or it might be a soldier\nyou're meant for. I couldn't interfere with your life. It's an unco\nresponsibility, interfering with a destiny, a terrible thing.\"\n\n\"Will you talk to my Uncle Robin? Will you?\"\n\n\"Och, now, how could I talk to your Uncle Robin, him that's written\nbooks, and is counted one of the seven learned men of Ireland? Sure, I\nwouldn't understand what he'd be saying, and he'd have no ear for a\ncommon sailing man. If it was your Uncle Alan, now--\"\n\n\"There's not a person in the world but has the ear of my Uncle Robin.\nAnd there's none easier to talk to, not even the apple woman at the\ncorner of the quay. Will you come with me and talk to him?\"\n\n\"I couldn't, laddie. Your Uncle Alan, now--\"\n\n\"I'll do the talking, then; but will you come?\"\n\n\"Och, wee fellow, it would be foolish.\"\n\n\"You wouldn't have me think hard of a man of Raghery?\"\n\n\"No, I wouldn't have any one think hard of the folk of Raghery, so I\nsuppose I'll have to come. I don't know what your Uncle Robin will say\nto me for putting notions in your head. It's awful foolish. But I'll\ncome.\"\n\n\nSection 10\n\n\"So there'd never be the making of a scholar in me, Uncle Robin. A ship\non the sea or a new strange person would be always more to me nor a\nbook. I can read and write and figure; what more do I want? And, och,\nsir, the school would be a prison to me, the scholars droning and ink on\ntheir fingers, and the hard-faced masters at the desk. I'd be woe for\nthe outside, for the sunshine and the water and the bellying winds--\"\n\nHis Uncle Robin tapped the window-pane of the club and thought hard. The\nRathlin sailor stood by, puzzled.\n\n\"But, childeen asthore, sure you don't know now what you want. Your\ncareer, laddie! Think a bit! The church, for instance--\"\n\n\"Och, Uncle Robin, is it me in the church that must say my prayers by my\nlee lone, so loath am I to let the people see what's in me? I'd be the\nqueer minister, dumb as a fish--\"\n\n\"You once had a notion for the army, laddie.\"\n\n\"So I had, sir, and fine I'd like the uniforms and the swords and the\nhorses, but I wouldn't have the heart to kill a man, and me never\nseeing him before. If a man did me a wrong, I'd kill him quick as I'd\nwash my hands, but never seeing him before, I could na, I just could\nna--\"\n\n\"It's a clean thing, the sea,\" the Raghery man ventured.\n\n\"He's so very young,\" objected Uncle Robin.\n\n\"There's nothing but that or the books for me, Uncle Robin. A sailor or\na scholar--and I don't think I'd make out well with the books.\"\n\n\"The books aren't all they're cracked up to be, wee Shane. I've written\nbooks myself, and who reads them but a wheen of graybeards, and they\ndrowsing by the fire? Knowledge, laddie, I have that.... And it isn't\neven wisdom. Knowledge is like dry twigs you collect with care to make a\nbit fire you can warm your shins at, and wisdom is the gift of God\nthat's like the blossom on the gorse. I've searched books and taken out\nthe marrow of dead men's brains, and after all, even all my knowledge\nmay be wrong.... Your father's name will be remembered as long as the\nGaidhlig lasts, for songs that came to him as easily as a woman's kiss.\nAnd your Uncle Alan's footprints are near the pole. And Mungo is\nremembered forever because he died with a laugh. Not that I'm saying\nanything against them, wee Shane; better men will never be seen. But\nDaniel Donelly's name is remembered because he beat Cooper in a fight,\nand songs were made about it. And I'll be remembered only when some old\nlibrarian dusts a forgotten book. And I was supposed to be the wise pup\no' the litter, with my books and my study. And all I have now is a\ntroubled mind in my latter days. Aye, the books!...\"\n\n\"Shall I go to sea, sir?\"\n\n\"Is it up to me? And how about your mother, laddie?\"\n\n\"Oh, there's little warmth within her for me, sir. She's a bitter woman.\nShe does na like my father's breed.\"\n\n\"Are you your father's breed through, wee caddie? Are you Campbell all?\nHere, gi' us a look at your face. Aye, the eyes, the nose, the proud\nthrow to the head of you. I'm afeared there's little of your mother in\nyou, laddie; afeared there's none at all.\"\n\n\"I'm no' ashamed o' my kind, sir.\"\n\n\"And you're set on going to sea?\"\n\n\"I'd like it fine, sir.\"\n\n\"And if it does na turn out the way you thought it would, you're not\ngoing to cry or turn sour?\"\n\n\"I thought you knew me better nor that, Uncle Robin.\"\n\n\"I do.\" The big man laid his hand on the boy's shoulder and smiled at\nthe shipmaster. \"Take him, Raghery man!\"\n\n\nSection 11\n\nThough all was wonder to wee Shane, there was so much of it that it\nflicked through his head like a dream: the hazy September afternoon; the\nlong, lean vessel like a greyhound; the sails white as a swan's wing;\nthe cordage that rattled like wood; the bare-footed, bearded sailors;\nthe town of Carrickfergus in the offing; the _lap-lap-lap_ of water; the\nsilent man at the wheel; the sudden transition of the friendly Raghery\nman into a firm, authoritative figure, quick as a cat, rapping out\ncommands like a sergeant-major.\n\nThe town of Carrickfergus began to slip by as if drawn by horses. The\nmate ran up the ladder of the poop.\n\n\"Topsails, McCafferty!\" the Raghery man ordered.\n\n\"Topsails, sir.\"\n\nA minute later there came the mate's voice from amidships:\n\n\"Sheet home the topsails--and put your backs into it!\"\n\nPatter of feet. An accordion began to whine like a tinker. Creak and\nstrain. Faster lapping of water. A song raised in chorus:\n\n  As I came a-tacking down Paradise Street--\n    Yo-ho! Blow the man down!\n  As I came a-tacking down Paradise Street--\n    Give us some time till we blow the man down!\n\n  A trim little bumboat I chanced for to meet!\n    Blow, bullies, blow the man down!\n  A trim little bumboat I chanced for to meet!\n    Give us some time till we blow the man down!\n\n  She was round in the counter and bluff in the bows!\n    Yo-ho! Blow the man down!\n  She was round in the counter and bluff in the bows!\n    Give us some time till we blow the man down.\n    Blow the man down!\n    Blow, bullies! Blow the man down!\n\n\n\n\nPART TWO\n\nTHE WAKE AT ARDEE\n\n\nSection 1\n\nThe feeling that was uppermost in him as he sat outside the thatched\ncottage in the moonlight, while the wake was within, was not grief at\nhis wife's death; not a shattered mind that his life, so carefully laid\nout not twelve months before, was disoriented; not any self-pity; not\nany grievance against God, such as little men might have: but a strange\ndumb wonder. There she lay within, in her habit of a Dominican lay\nsister, her hands waxy, her face waxy, her eyelids closed. And six\nguttering candles were about her, and women droned their prayers with a\ndroning as of bees. There she lay with her hands clasped on a wooden\ncrucifix. And no more would the robins wake her, and they fussing in the\ngreat hawthorn-tree over the coming of dawn. No longer would she rake\nthe ash from the peat and blow the red of it to a little blaze. No\nlonger would she beat his dog out of the house with the handle of the\nbroom. No longer would she forgather with the neighbors over a pot of\ntea for a pleasant vindictive chat. No longer would she look out to sea\nfor him with her half-loving, half-inimical eyes. No longer in her\nsharpish voice would she recite her rosary and go to bed.\n\nAnd to-morrow they would bury her--there would be rain to-morrow: the\nwind was sou'east,--they would lower her, gently as though she were\nalive, into a rectangular slot in the ground, mutter alien prayers in an\nalien tongue with business of white magic, pat the mound over as a child\npats his castle of sand on the sea-shore, and leave her there in the\nrain.\n\nA month from now they would say a mass for her, a year from now another,\nbut to-morrow, to-day, yesterday even, she was finished with all of\nlife: with the fussy, excited robins of dawn; with the old dog that\nwanted to drowse by the fire; with the young husband who was either too\nmuch or too little of a man for her; with the clicking beads she would\ntell in her sharpish voice; with each thing; with everything.\n\nAnd here was the wonder of it, the strange dumb wonder, that the\nsnapping of her life meant less in reality to him than the snapping of a\nstay aboard ship. The day after to-morrow he would mount the deck of\nPatrick Russell's boat, and after a few crisp orders would set out on\nthe eternal sea, as though she were still alive in her cottage, as\nthough indeed she had never even lived, and northward he would go past\nthe purple Mull of Cantyre; past the Clyde, where the Ayrshire sloops\ndanced like bobbins on the water; past the isles, where overhead drove\nthe wedges of the wild swans, trumpeting as on a battle-field; past the\nHebrides, where strange arctic birds whined like hurt dogs; northward\nstill to where the northern lights sprang like dancers in the black\nwinter nights; eastward and southward to where the swell of the Dogger\nBank rose, where the fish grazed like kine. Over the great sea he would\ngo as though nothing had happened, not even the snapping of a stay--down\nto the sea, where the crisp winds of dawn were, and the playful, stupid,\nshort-sighted porpoises; the treacherous sliding icebergs; and the gulls\nthat cried with the sea's immense melancholy; and the great plum-colored\nwhales....\n\n\nSection 2\n\nTo his nostrils, sterilized as they were by the salt air of the sea, the\nrich scents of Louth came in a rushing profusion. The wild roses of\nJune were like the high notes of a violin, and there was clover, and\nmown hay. In the southeast the clouds were banking, but still the moon\nrose high, and the cottage was clear as in daylight, clearer even in the\nmind's eye--the whitewashed walls, the thatch like silver, the swallows'\nnests beneath the eaves. The hard round sea-cobbles beneath his feet\nwere clear and individual, and to where he sat in the haggard came a\ngirl's song from down the road:\n\n  \"Oh, Holland is a wondrous place and in it grows much green.\n  It's a wild inhabitation for my young love to be in.\n  There the sugar-cane grows plentiful, and leaves on every tree,\n  But the low, lowlands of Holland are between my love and me.\"\n\nHe listened with a cocked ear, and smiled as he thought how easy it\nwould be to stroll down the road to where the singing girl was, and\naccost her pleasantly: \"So he's in Holland, is he? That's the queer and\nfoolish place for him to be, and I here!\" There would be banter, quick\nand smart as a whip, a scuffle, a clumsily placed kiss, laughter,\nanother scuffle, and a kiss that found its mark somehow, then a saunter\ntogether down the scented loaning while the June moon rode high and the\ncrickets sang.\n\nO my God! here he was thinking about love, and his wife lay inside and\nshe dead!\n\nAnd a new light wonder sprang up and whirled within the big dumb wonder\nthat was on him: that here was he, a lad not yet twenty-two, with a dead\nwife on his hands, while his shipmates were off with the laughter of\nyoung women in their ears after the silent and tense watches of the sea.\nHis captain had gone home to Newry to where his wife awaited him, the\ntall, graceful woman with the hair like black silk and the black eyes\nand the black ear-rings and the slim, white, enigmatic hands. And the\nfirst mate had gone to Rostrevor with a blond, giggling girl, and the\ncrew were at Sally Bishop's in Dundalk, draining the pints of frothy\nporter and making crude material love to Sally Bishop's blowsy brown\ngirls, some chucking their silver out with a laugh--the laugh of men who\nhad fought hurricanes, and some bargaining shrewdly.... But here he was,\nhome, with his wife, and her dead. And if she hadn't been dead, she\nwould have been half loving, half inimical toward him, her arms and\nbosom open, but a great stranger.... He couldn't understand. Well, she\nwas dead, and ... he didn't know....\n\nA bent, fattish figure in a shawl came toward him through the haggard,\nhis wife's mother. There was the sweetish, acrid odor of whisky.\n\n\"Shane _avick_, are you there all alone, mourning for the pleasant,\nbeautiful one who's gone?\"\n\n\"I was just sitting down.\"\n\n\"You wouldn't like a wee drop of consolation?\"\n\n\"Whisky? No, thanks.\"\n\n\"Just the least taste?\"\n\n\"No, thanks.\"\n\n\"And I after bringing it out to you in a naggin bottle. Just the wetting\nof your lips, _agra_, would cheer you up, and you down to the ground.\"\n\n\"No!\"\n\nThe old woman sat on the stone ditch beside him and began swaying\nbackward and forward, and the keening note came into her voice:\n\n\"Is it gone? Is it gone you are, Moyra _a sthore_? Sure, 't was the\nkindly daughter you were to me, and me old and not worth my salt, a\nbroken _cailleach_ hobbling on a stick. Never did you refuse me the cup\no' tea so strong a mouse could walk on it. And the butcher's meat o'\nChristmas, sure your old ma must have a taste, too. And many's the brown\negg you let me have, and they bringing a high price on the Wednesday\nmarket. And the ha'porth o' snuff--sure you never came home without it,\nand you at Dundalk fair. Kindly you were as the rains of April, and my\nheart is ashes now you're gone....\"\n\nShane paced off through the haggard. There was the _glug-glug_ of a\nbottle, and again the sweetish, acrid odor of whisky. He turned back.\n\n\"Only to one were you kinder nor to myself and that was to the lad here,\nwhose heart is broken for you. Dumb with grief he is, now you're gone.\nAnd all you did for him! You might have married a strong farmer would\nhave a dozen cows, horses would pull a cart or plow, hens by the dozen,\nand flitches of bacon hanging in the kitchen. Or you might have married\na man had a shop and sat at your ease in the back room, like a lady\nborn. Or you might have married a gager and gone to Dublin and mixed\nwith the grand quality. And your mother would have a black silk dress,\nand shoes with buttons on them. But you married this young fellow goes\nto sea, so much was the great love on you for him. Love came to you like\na thunder-storm, and left you trembling like a leaf, and now you're\ndead--ochanee! ochanee! ochanee o!\"\n\nHer voice changed from the shrill keen to a shrewd whine:\n\n\"You'll be leaving me something to remember her by, Shane Oge, and her a\nfathom deep beneath me in the cold ground. And a trinket or two, or a\ndress, maybe, or a bangle would keep my heart warm?\"\n\n\"You can have them all.\"\n\n\"All is it? Ah, sure, it's the grand big heart is in you, lad o' the\nNorth. And are they all to be mine, the silver brooch you bought her\nfrom the Dutch city, and the ring with the pearl in it, and the dresses\nof silk from France, and the shoes that have buckles? Are they for me,\nhinny?\"\n\n\"Yes, yes. Take them.\"\n\n\"And the wee furnishings of the house, the feather-bed is soft to lie\non, and the dresser with the delft, and the creepy stool beside the\nfire, the noble chairs? You wouldn't be selling them to the stranger,\nShane Oge?\"\n\n\"No, you can have those, too.\"\n\n\"And the house, too? Young noble fellow, where is your wife's mother to\nlay her gray hairs? Couldn't you fix the house, too?\"\n\n\"The house is not mine, and I can't afford to buy it.\"\n\n\"But 't is you you are the rich Protestant family. Your uncles and your\nmother, hinny. Rotten with gold they are, and me just a poor old\n_cailleach_ that gave you the white lamb o' the flock.\"\n\n\"We'll look after you. My uncle Alan Campbell will be here in a day or\nso and fix everything. But I'm afraid the house is out of the question.\"\n\n\"Oh, sure it would be a noble thing to have the house, and they around\nme dying with envy of my state and grandeur. At fair or at wake great\nrespect they would pay me, and the priests of God would be always\ncalling. The house, fine lad, give me the house!\"\n\n\"You'll have to speak to my Uncle Alan.\"\n\n\"Alan Campbell is a hard Northern man.\"\n\n\"Nevertheless, you'll have to speak to him.\"\n\n\"_A mhic mheirdrighe!_\" Her mouth hissed. \"O son of a harlot!\"\n\nShane wheeled like a sloop coming about.\n\n\"You forget I've got the Gaelic myself, old woman.\"\n\n\"Oh, sure, what did I say, fine lad, but _avick machree_, son of my\nheart? _Avick machree_, I said. O son of my heart, that's what you are.\nYou wouldn't take wrong meaning from what an old woman said, and her\nwith her teeth gone, and under the black clouds of sorrow!\"\n\nA glint in the moonlight caught Shane's eyes. He gripped her right hand.\n\n\"Is that Moyra's wedding-ring you have on? Did you--did you--take\nit--from her hand?\"\n\n\"Oh, sure, what use would she have for it, and she in the sods of\nBallymaroo? And the grand Australian gold is in it, worth a mint of\nmoney. And what use would you have for it, and you in strange parts,\nwhere a passionate foreign woman would be giving you love, maybe? The\nfine lad you are, will draw the heart of many. But it's drawing back\ncoldly they'd be, and they seeing that on your finger, or on a ribbon\naround your neck. Drawing back they'd be, and giving the love was yours\nto another fellow. A sin to waste the fine Australian gold it is. And\nyou wouldn't begrudge me the price of a couple o' heifers would grow\ninto grand cows? You wouldn't, fine lad--\"\n\nHe flung her hand from him so savagely that she fell, and he went\nswiftly toward the house where the dead woman was. Back of him in the\nhaggard came the _glug-glug_ of the naggin bottle, and from down the\nloaning came the rich, untrained contralto of the singing girl:\n\n  \"Nor shoe nor stocking will I put on, nor comb go in my hair.\n  And neither coal nor candle-light shine in my chamber fair.\n  Nor will I wed with any young man until the day I die,\n  Since the low lowlands of Holland are between my love and me.\"\n\n\nSection 3\n\nAs he paused at the half-door, the laughter and the chatter in the\nkitchen ceased, and he was aware of the blur of faces around the room,\nwhite faces of men and women and alien eyes. Over the peat fire--there\nwas a fire even in June--the great black kettle sang on the crane, to\nmake tea for the mourners. Here and there were bunches of new clay pipes\nscattered, and long rolls of twisted tobacco, for the men to smoke, and\nsaucers full of snuff for both men and women. A great paraffin lamp\nthrew broad, opaque shadows, making the whole a strange blur in the\nkitchen, while in the bedroom opening off it, where the tense, dead\nwoman lay, was a glare of candles as from footlights, and there gathered\nthe old women of the neighborhood, discussing everything in hushed,\nvindictive whispers--the price of cows, morbid diseases, the new wife\nsome man had, and whether such a girl was with child.... And the dead\nwoman, who had loved talk such as this, as a drunkard loves the glass,\ngave no heed.... Strange!... And every hour or so they would flash to\ntheir knees, like some quick instinctive movement of birds, and now\ncarelessly, now over-solemnly they would say a rosary for the dead\nwoman's soul:\n\n\"_Ar n-Athair, ta ar neamh_--\" they would gabble. \"Our Father, Who art\nin Heaven--\" and then a long suspiration: \"'_Se do bheatha, 'Mhuire_!\"\n\"Hail, Mary! Full of grace!\"\n\nBut in the kitchen they would be laughing, chatting, playing crude\nforfeits, telling grotesque stories, giving riddles, and now, to the\nmuted sound of a melodeon, a man would dance a hornpipe.... And men\nwould sneak out to the byre in twos and threes for a surreptitious glass\nof whisky.... And suddenly they would rush in and join in the rosary:\n\n\"_Ar n-Athair, ta ar neamh_.... _Se do bheatha, 'Mhuire!_ ...\"\n\nIt was all so grotesque, so empty, so play-actor-like--so inharmonious\nwith Death! Death was very terrible or very peaceful, thought Shane\nCampbell of the sea and the Antrim Glens. \"Down from your horse when\nDeath or the King goes by,\" went the Antrim old word. But here the house\nof death was a booth of Punchinello.\n\n[Illustration]\n\nMore aware even than of the indignity of it all was he of the hatred\nabout him. They hated him for his alien race, his alien faith. Not\none of the men but would have killed him had they had courage,\nbecause his head was high, his step firm. The women hated him because he\nhad chosen one from among them and given her honor and gifts. And his\nwife's mother hated him with the venomous, nauseous hatred that old\nwomen bear. And yet they'd have loved him if he'd given way to\nhysterical, unprofound grief, or become ... drunk! They'd have\nunderstood him. But all they had for him was hatred now. Even the dead\nwoman on the bed hated him.... Ah, well, only a day or so more, and he'd\ncome about. A leg to leeward, and he'd shake them off as a great ship\nleaves behind it the troublesome traders' bumboats.\n\nThere came to him the shrill keening of the old woman as some one\nbrought her toward the house:\n\n\"Ochanee! Ochanee! Ochanee o! the Shepherd's lamb! She's gone from us!\nThe high branch on the pleasant little tree! And what's to become of me\nin my latter days! Me that thought I'd have the beautiful house to live\nin, and a horse and cart, and a wake would be the envy of many, and not\nthe curate, but the parish priest himself, to be at the head of the\nfuneral. And now I'm to be thrown against the great cruelty of the harsh\nNorthern men! Nine black curses against them and theirs, and on my bare\nknees I say it. Och, white gull o' the harbor, why did you die? Ochanee!\nOchanee!\"\n\nThe gabbled rosary, the low laughter in the kitchen, the clink of\nglasses, the howling of the _cailleach_--all these noises repulsed him\nlike a forefront of battle. So he did not go into the house, but took\nhis hand from the half-door and returned to the haggard, to the grave,\nunderstanding silence of the moon.\n\n\nSection 4\n\nBecause he was so young, and thought he knew so much when in reality he\nknew so little, young Shane had thought, when he met Moyra Dolan, that\nhe had discovered the morning star. Five and a half years at sea, as\napprentice and navigator, had shown his eyes much and his heart little.\nHe knew Bermuda and the harbor of Kingston. He had beaten up the China\nSeas. He had seen the clouds over Table Mountain. He knew Baltimore. He\nhad seen the bowsprits of the great Indiamen thrust over the quays of\nPoplar parish like muskets leveled over a barricade. And to him it was\njust a wonder, a strange spectacle. The streets were strange as in a\ndream, and the folk were strange as in a play. One wandered down an\navenue, seeing the queer commodities in the shops and booths. One\nwandered to the right. One wandered to the left. And there was great\ndelight to finding a street one had seen before, maybe only five minutes\nago, and one felt one was getting somewhere, was understanding the new\ncountry.\n\nBut one never did understand the new country. All the people were\nstrange. One could not imagine them about the daily business of life,\nwaking, eating, buying, and selling. Black men and ocher-colored folk.\nThere seemed to be a mystery somewhere. One imagined them gathering at\nnight in secret to begin their real un-understood life. At times it\nseemed impossible that it was the same world. Surely the sun that struck\nlike a hammer in Jamaica could not be the gracious warm planet that\ngilded the gorse of the Antrim glens. And up the Baltic in mid-winter it\nwas bleak as a candle, and even then in Antrim it had a great\nkindliness. Nor were the winds the same. The hot puffs of the Indian\nOcean, the drunken, lurching flaws of Biscay Bay, the trades that worked\nsteadily as ants, had not the human quality of the winds of the Nine\nGlens, that were now angry as an angry man, now gentle as a gentle\nwoman.\n\nOnly one thing was constant, and that was the women whom sailors know in\nports. And they wore masks. The same easily forced laughter, the same\ncrude flattery, the complacent arms, the eternal eager hand....\n\nAnd then one day the new port palled, like a book one has read too\noften, or a picture one has looked at over-long. And it was sheet home\nthe royals and off to a new port, where there were new strange people,\nand streets laid another way, and other things in the merchants' booths,\nand a new language to pick up a phrase or two of.\n\nBut in the end all palled for a time, the aphrodisiac tropic smell; the\ncoral waters, clear as well water at home; the white houses with the\ngreen jalousies; the lush, coarse green. And the melancholic drums of\nthe East palled. And palled the grimness of the North. And the unceasing\nprocessional of strange secret faces wearied the eye and the mind. And\nthe angular spiritual edges of shipmates wore toward one through the\nuniform of flesh, became annoying, sometimes unbearable.\n\nAnd then an immense yearning would come over young Shane for the beloved\nfaces in the lamplight, for the white road over the purple heather, for\nthe garden where the greened sun-dial was, with its long motto in the\nIrish letter:\n\n  _Is mairg a baidhtear in am an anaithe\n  Na tig an ghrian in dhiaidh na fearthainne_--\n\nas if anybody didn't know that, that it was a pity to be drowned in time\nof storm, for the sun shines brightly when the rain goes!\n\nBut the sun-dial was mirrored in his heart, and the purple mountain and\nthe great dun house. The winds he sniffed as a hunting dog does, and\neach tack to port or starboard either thrilled or cast him down.... When\nwould he get there? Would it be cool of the evening, when the bats were\nout? Or would it be in the sunshine of the morning, when a great smell\nwas from the heather? And who would hear the wicket-gate click as the\nlatch was lifted, and put a welcome before him with a great shout,\nuncles Alan or Robin, or a servant girl or boy, or the bent old gardener\nwho kept the lawn true as a bowling-green?... Or would it be his mother?\n\n\nSection 5\n\nAboard ship the young apprentices had their problems, problems of\nconduct, or of girls at home, or of money in port, but for young Shane\nthere was always the problem of his mother.\n\nAt home he had regarded as a matter of fact that she should come and go\nin her hard, efficient French way. It had not seemed strange to him that\nher mouth was tight, her eyes hard as diamonds. It was to him one with\nhis Uncle Robin's solemnity and Alan Donn's gruff sportsmanship. But\naway from home he thought of it, brooded over it. Her letters to him\nwere so curt, so cut and dried! She wrote of the birth of another child\nto young Queen Victoria,--as if that mattered a tinker's curse!--or how\nher Holland bulbs, which she had bought at Belfast, had withered and\ndied. She directed him \"to pray God to keep him pure in mind and body,\nyour affectionate mother, Louise de Damery Campbell.\" Alan Donn's\nletters had the grand smell of harness about them. \"You'll mind the\nbrown gelding we bought at Ballymena. He disgraced us at Dublin in the\njumping competitions. You know he can jump his own height, but he got\nthe gate after three tries. I could have graet like a bairn. Well, this\nwill be all from your loving Uncle Alan. P.S. I caught the white trout\nin Johnson's Brae burn. I was after him, and he was dodging me for six\nyears. Your loving Uncle Alan, P.P.S. The championship is at Newcastle\nthis year, and I think I've a grand chance. If you're home, you can\ncaddy for me. Your loving Uncle Alan.\"\n\nUncle Robin's letters had vast wisdom. \"Ay be reading the books, laddie.\nAn ill-educated man feels always at a disadvantage among folk of talent.\nAboard ship you can read and think more than at a university. I've got a\nparcel for you to take when you go again. Hakluyt's Voyages and a good\nMarco Polo. And the new book of Mr. Dickens, 'The Haunted Man.' And\nthere's a great new writer you'll not want to miss, by name of\nThackeray.\" And there'd be the Bank of England note, \"for fear you might\nbe needing it on a special occasion, and not having it, and feeling\nbad.\" Dear Uncle Robin! And then the flash of tenderness, like a\nrainbow: \"God bless you and keep you, my brother's son!\"\n\nHis Uncle Robin's letters he would greet with a smile, and perhaps a bit\nmoistness in the eye; Alan Donn's with a grin, as an elder brother's.\nBut his mother's letters he would approach with a coldness akin to fear.\nHe hated to open them. It was like an unpleasant duty.\n\nThe realization of her was always a chilling disappointment, but the\ndream of her was a great hope. And in the black waters of the China\nSeas, or in the night watches off the Azores, where the porpoises played\nin the phosphorescence, there would come a sea-change over the knowledge\nhe had of her. All the spiritual, all the mental angles of her faded\ninto gracious line, and on the tight French lips of her a smile would\nplay as a flower opens, and her eyes, hard as diamonds, would open and\nbecome kindly as a lighted house. And the strange things of the heart\nwould come out, like little shy rabbits, or like the young tortoises,\nand bask in that kindly picture. And the things that were between them,\nthat could not be said, but just sensed, as the primroses of spring are\nsensed, not seen, not felt, hardly smelt even, but sensed.... The\nhesitant deep things he would say and the dignified, smiling answer, or\nthe pressure of the hand even, and the inclination of the shoulder....\n\nAnd the people he would meet who would ask him about his mother, and he\ncould answer nothing, so that they thought him stupid and unthoughtful.\nBut really what was there to say?... And once when he sprang into Biscay\nBay after a cabin-boy who had fallen over the taffrail, and the lad's\nmother had thanked him in Plymouth for saving the child's life: \"Your\nmother will be very proud of you,\" the old woman said. But the reality\nof the harsh Frenchwoman came to him like a slap in the face. \"Christ,\nif she only were!\" his heart cried. But the clipped little Scots-Irish\nvoice replied, \"Aye, I suppose she will.\"\n\nAnd again the soft mood would come, and then he would have a letter from\nher, ending with that harsh command, that was a gust of some bleak\ntempest of her own life, where his father had perished: \"Pray God to\nkeep you pure in mind and body!\"\n\nAnd homeward bound again, in the soft murmur of the wind among the\nshrouds, and the little laughter of the water at the bows, there would\nabide with him again the dream mother of the night watches, until he\nsaid to himself that surely the reality was false, and at the\ngarden-gate she would be waiting for him with a great depth of kindness\nin her eyes, and arms warm as sunshine, and a bosom where a boy might\nrest his head for a moment after the great harshness of the strange\nplaces.\n\nBut the kindliness came not from her. It came from Robin More, who ran\ndown the garden faster than his dignity should have allowed him. \"Are\nyou all right, wee Shane? Is everything all right with you? You're\nlooking fine, but you haven't been sick, wee fellow? Tell me, you\nhaven't been sick?\" Or from Alan Donn, with his great snort of\nlaughter: \"Christ! are you home again? And all the good men that's been\nlost at sea! Well, the devil's childer have the devil's luck. Eigh,\nladdie, gie's a feel o' ye. _A Righ_--O King of Graces, but you're the\nlean pup! Morag, Nellie, Cassie, some tea! and be damned quick about\nit!\"\n\nAnd then his mother would come into the room, like a cold wind or a thin\nghost, and there would be a kiss on the cheek, a cold, precise peck,\nlike a bird's. And, \"Did you have a good voyage?\" just as if she said,\n\"Do you think we'll have rain?\"\n\nOh, well, to hell with it! as Alan Donn said when he flubbed his\napproach to the last green for some championship or other. \"What you\nnever had, you never lost!\"\n\nAye, true indeed. What you never had you couldn't very well lose. Aye,\nthere was a lot in that. Just so; but--\n\nBoys do be thinking long....\n\n\nSection 6\n\nBecause his Uncle Alan was in Scotland somewhere shooting deer and would\nnot be home for several days, and because Uncle Robin was in Paris, and\nbecause the _Goban Saor_ put into Dundalk to take a cargo of unbleached\nlinen, young Shane decided to stay there for a few days before\nproceeding northward to the Antrim Glens. He felt he couldn't face the\nhouse at Cushendu with his cold, precise mother alone there, so he\naccepted the hospitality of an apprentice friend.\n\nIt was at a country barn dance during these few days that he met Moyra\nDolan.\n\nA tallish, tawny-haired woman with the dead-white skin that goes with\nreddish hair, with steel for eyes, there was a grace and carriage to her\nthat put her aside from the other peasant girls as a queen may\nmasquerade as a slave and yet betray herself as a queen. Other girls\nthere were as pretty, with their hair like flax and their eyes like blue\nwater; with hair like a dim blue cloud and eyes like a smudge of\ncharcoal. But none had her teeth, her small ankles, her long, sensitive\nhands. Some strain of the Stuart cavaliers had crept into that hardy\npeasant stock on the way to the defeat of the Boyne Water.... She might\nhave seemed nothing but a pretty lady's maid in London or Dublin but in\nNorth Louth she was like a queen....\n\nHer looks were her tragedy, for she held herself too good for a\nlaboring man to marry, and, having no dower, no farmer would have her.\nAmong the peasantry romance does not count, but land. And if the Queen\nof Sheba, and she having nothing but her shift, were to offer herself in\nmarriage to a strong farmer, he would refuse her for the cross-eyed\nwoman in the next townland who had twenty acres and five good milch\ncows.... Only for the very rich or the very poor is romance!\n\nHer only chance for marriage was a matter of luck. She would have to\nmeet some government official, or some medical student home on his\nholidays, or some small merchant whom her beauty would unbalance, as\ndrink would unbalance him. And she must dazzle, and her old mother play\nand catch him, as a jack pike is dazzled by a spoon bait, hooked, and\nbrought ashore. She might marry or might miss, or grow into an acidulous\nred-headed woman. It was a matter of luck. And her luck was in. She met\nyoung Shane Campbell.\n\nThey danced together. They wandered in the moonlight. They met in the\ncountry lanes. And they were very silent, she because she played a game,\nand a counter is better than a lead, and he because he was in love with\nher. Had it been only a matter of sweethearting, he would have been\nmerry as a singing bird, full of chatter, roughing it with her for a\nkiss. But it was love with him, and a thing for life, and life was long\nand more serious than death.... So he was silent.\n\nHe was silent when he went home for a week, silent with uncles Robin and\nAlan, who sensed he was going through one of the crises of adolescence,\nand knew the best thing to do was to leave him alone. He was silent with\nhis mother, who saw nothing, cared nothing, so intent was she on\nrevolving within herself as inexorably as the planets revolve in space.\nHe decided to spend the last days of his leave in Dundalk. And at the\nrailroad station in Ballymena he hazarded a look at Alan Donn.\n\n\"Uncle Alan--\" and he stopped.\n\n\"What is it, laddie? Is it a girl troubling you? Take my advice and look\nher in the eyes and, 'You can love me or leave me, and to hell with\nyou!' tell her. 'Do you see this right foot of mine?' says you. 'Well,\nit's pointed to the next townland, where there's just as pretty a one as\nyou.' And you'll find her come around; maybe there'll be a bit of an\nargument, but she'll come around. And if she doesn't, there'd have been\nno hope for you, anyway. A touch o' the spur for the lazy mare and a bit\nsugar for the jumper! And when you've done loving her, gie her a chuck\nin the chin: 'Good-by! Good luck! What you keep to yoursel' 'll worry\nnobody,' says you. And to hell with her!\"\n\n\"Alan Donn!\"\n\n\"Oh, it's that way, is it, Shaneen? If you're in deep water, there's\nnone but yourself can help you, laddie. I thought it was just maybe a\ncase o' laugh and kiss me. But it's different, is it? There's no use\ngiving advice. What's in you will out. But remember this: when it's\nover, for good or bad, your Uncle Alan's here, to laugh with you or\ngreet with you or help you out of a hole. So--\n\n\"Good-by, laddie. _Beannacht leat!_ My blessing with you!\"\n\n\nSection 7\n\n\"Young lad, what is this you have done to my fine young daughter?\"\n\n\"I have done nothing, Bhean 'i Dolain,\" young Shane flared up, \"save in\nhonor, and the man or woman who says other lies.\"\n\n\"Agra, I know that. I know there's no harm in you from head to foot. And\nthe trouble you've put on her is in her heart. All day long she sighs,\nand is listless as a shaded plant that does be needing the sun. All\nnight long she keeps awake, and the wee silent tears come down her face.\nAnd before my eyes she's failing, and her step that was once light now\ndrags the like of a cripple's. Young lad of the North, you've put love\nin the heart of her and sorrow in the mind.\"\n\n\"I'm not so sprightly in the mind myself, woman Dolan.\"\n\n\"I know, avick. I know. Isn't it myself that's suffered the seven pangs\nof love and I a young girl? But it's easy on a man, avick. He can go\ninto the foreign countries, and put it out of his mind, or take to the\ndrink and numb the great pain. But for a woman it's different. It's the\nlike of a disfiguration that all can see. And when you're gone away,\nsure all will remember, for men do be minding long. The marrying time\nwill come, and they'll look at my grand young daughter: strong farmer,\nand merchant of the shop, and drover does be going to England for the\ncattle-fairs, and they'll say: 'Isn't that the red girl gave love to the\nsailing fellow, and burnt her heart out so that there's no sap in it for\nme?' And they'll pass her by, my grand young daughter, that's the equal\nof any.\"\n\n\"And what would you have me do, woman of the house?\"\n\n\"What would any decent man do but marry her?\"\n\n\"Aye!... Aye! I thought of marrying her, if she'd have me.... But we\nhardly know each other yet ... and maybe I'm too young....\"\n\n\"If you're able to handle a ship, you're able to handle a woman, young\nlad. And what time is better for marriage nor the first flush of youth?\nSure you grow together like the leaves upon the tree. Let you not be\nputting it off now, but spring like a hero.\"\n\n\"But isn't the matter of her faith between us, woman of the house?\"\n\n\"And sure that can be fixed later. Will the priest mind, do you think,\nso long as she does her duty? And a sixpence in the plate on Sunday is\nbetter nor a brown ha'penny, and a half-sovereign at Easter will soothe\nblack anger like healing grass. Very open in thought I am, and I knowing\nthe seven pangs of love. Let you go to your own clergyman, and she'll go\nwith you, I'll warrant, so eaten is she by love.\"\n\n\"My people, woman o' the house--\"\n\n\"Your people, is it? Sure it isn't your people is marrying my grand\nyoung daughter, but you yourself. The old are crabbit, and they do be\nthinking more of draining a field, or of the price of flax, nor of the\npain and delights of love. And it's always objections. But there can be\nno objecting when the job's finished.\"\n\nShe looked at him shrewdly.\n\n\"A grand influence, a grand steadying influence is marriage on a sailing\nman. It keeps you from spending your money in foreign ports, where you\nonly buy trickery for your silver. And when you have a wife at home,\nyou'll have little truck with fancy women, who have husbands behind the\nscreen, sometimes, and them with knives.... So I've heard tell.... Or\nmaybe get an evil sickness. Listen to an old woman has wisdom, bold\nlad.\"\n\n\"When I come from my voyage....\"\n\n\"Dark lad, if anything happens to you, and you drowning in the black\nwater, the great regret that will be on you and the water gurgling into\nyour lungs, and, 'Wasn't I the fool of the world,' you'll say, 'that\nmight have heard the crickets singing in the night-time and my white\nlove by my side? And might have had power of kissing and lovemaking, but\nwas young and foolish, and lay be my lee lone....'\"\n\nBut this was the wrong tack, the old woman noticed, and came about.\n\n\"And all the time you're away, my daughter will be pining for you,\ndrooping and pining, my grand young daughter, and the spring will go out\nof her step and the light from her eyes and the luster from the hair\nthat's a wonder to all.... Oh, isn't it the cruel thing?\"\n\n\"My ship sails the day after to-morrow.\"\n\nShe saw surrender in his face, rose quickly, and went to the door.\n\n\"Come inside, Moyra, Moyreen! And be putting your cloak on, with the\nribbons that tie beneath your chin. And your dress of muslin that the\nlady in Newry gave you. And stockings. And your shoes of leather. And\nI'll be putting on my Paisley shawl. And this young boy will be getting\nMichael Doyle's horse and trap. Come in, Moyreen, come in and put haste\non you, for it's going to Dundalk we are, this day, this hour, this\nminute even!\"\n\n\nSection 8\n\nIt occurred to him as he sat in the haggard under the riding moon, not a\npitch shot from the house where his wife was being waked, that nothing\nwas disturbed because she was dead. It was not strange that the stars\nkept on their courses, for the death of neither king nor cardinal nor\nthe wreck of the greatest ship that ever sailed the seas would not move\nthem from their accustomed orbit. But not a robin in the hedge was\ndisturbed, not a rabbit in the field, not a weasel in the lane. Nature\nnever put off her impenetrable mask. Or did she really not care? And was\na human soul less to her than a worm in the soil?\n\nThere was a stir in the house. They would be making tea now for the men\nand women who said they were mourners.... The querulous voice of his\nwife's mother came to him as some one led her from the heated house into\nthe coolth of the June night.\n\n\"Great sacrifices we made for him, myself and the white love that's\nstretched beyond in the room. All we had we gave him, and all she found\nwas barren death, and I the barren charity of Northern men....\"\n\n\"Oh, sure, 'tis the pity of the world you are, Pegeen,\" a neighbor\ncomforted her.\n\n\"On his bended knees he came to her, asking for love,\" the _cailleach_\nwent on. \"On his bare and bended knees. And her heart melted toward him\nas the snow melts on the hills. 'And hadn't you better wait,' said I,\n'Moyreen Roe? With the great looks and the grand carriage of you, 'tis\na great match you can make surely. A gentleman from England, maybe,\nwould have a castle and fine lands, or the pick of the dealing men, and\nthey going from Belfast to Drogheda and stopping overnight at Ardee. Or\nwouldn't it be better for you to marry one of your own kind, would go to\nchurch with you in a kindly way?'\n\n\"'But if I don't marry this lad, he'll kill himself,' she says to me.\n\n\"'But your faith,' says I, ''avourneen, your holy faith, surely you will\nnot be forsaking that for this boy!'\"\n\n\"And what did she say to that, Pegeen?\" the neighbor asked.\n\n\"'Sure it's promised to turn he has,' she answered. 'And do everything\nis right by me, so much I love him!'\"\n\n\"The treacherous Ulster hound!\" The neighbor inveighed.\n\n\"Treacherous by race and treacherous by nature. Sure, can't you see it,\nthe way he treats me? Sorrow word he has for me, that bore the wife of\nhis bosom, barring, 'Alan Donn Campbell will see you and fix up\neverything.' And haven't I met Alan Campbell once before, and it's the\ncold eye he has and the hard heart. And this is all the return I get for\nbearing the white darling would be fit mate for a king. There was a\npublican of Dundalk had an eye on her, a big red-faced, hearty man. And\nshe might have married him but this lad came and spoiled everything. And\nif she'd married him, I'd have been sitting in the parlor of the public\nhouse, in a seemly black dress and a brooch in the bosom of it, taking\nmy pinch of snuff and my strong cup of tea with a drop of Hollands in it\nwould warm the cockles of your heart, and listening to the conversation\nof the fine customers and them loosening up with the drink. And the ould\ngrannies would have courtesied to me and hate in their hearts. But now a\nleaf on the wind am I, a broken twig on the stream. And the black men of\nUlster have me for a plaything, the men that have a hatred for me and my\nkind, so that it's a knife they'd put in you, or poison in your tea--\"\n\n\"Let you be coming in now, Pegeen. Let you be coming in now. And take a\ncup of tea would put heart in you, or something strong, maybe. And then\nwe'll be saying a prayer for her who's gone--\"\n\n\"Dead she is, the poor heart, dead she is, and better off nor I am--\"\n\nHer high querulousness died away as she went into the house, and again\nwas the silence of the riding moon. All her grief, all her lies, all\nher bitterness had not stirred a leaf upon the bough. Not a robin in\nthe hedge was disturbed by her calamity, not a rabbit in the field, not\na weasel in the lane....\n\n\nSection 9\n\nHe thought to himself: had they rushed him into this marriage? And he\nanswered himself truthfully, they had not. He could have said no, and\nstood by his no, young as he was, against every old woman and every\nyoung woman in the world. No, fast as they had worked, they hadn't\nworked faster than his thought had.\n\nAnd did he marry because he was in love with Moyra Dolan? He was in love\nwith her, he conceded that. For what the term was accepted at, he was in\nlove with her. Women he had met in his twenty years, great ladies of the\nUlster clans; shy, starched misses from the Friends' School; moody\npeasant girls; merry women of the foreign ports, and to none of them had\nhe felt that strange yearning he had felt toward Moyra Dolan, the\nstrange pull that sends the twig in the diviner's hands down toward the\nhidden water. Yes, he was in love with her, but was it because of that\nhe had married her? And he truthfully answered, no.\n\nHe remembered, the mood coming back to him as concretely as an action,\nwhat he had thought while the old woman had wheedled him with her voice\nlike butter. All he had thought in his prentice days at sea, all he had\nthought of in the night watches, all he had thought of in the loneliness\nof his mother's house, had gathered like great cloud-banks at night, and\nhad suddenly taken form and color and purpose in that one moment, as a\ncloud-bank at the coming of the sun.... Life had appeared to him in one\nbrief moment, and he had tried to grasp it.\n\nIt had seemed to him right that he would go down to the sea in ships all\nhis days, and trade in foreign ports, and work, transmuting effort into\ngain, and should come home to rest.\n\nAnd for whom was the gain? And where was home? Surely not for himself\nwas the gain, and home was not his cold mother's house? And now that he\nhad come to manhood as boys come at sea, braving danger and thinking\nmightily, it was for him to decide.\n\nA mirage, a seeming, a thing to look at, to go get bravely had come into\nhis mind in little pictures, like prints in a book. A thing of\nsimplicity, simple as the sea, and as colorful and as wholesome and as\nbeautiful. He thought of a little thatched and whitewashed house with a\ncobbled yard clean as a ship's decks, and a garden where the bluish\ngreen stalks and absurdly pretty flowers of potatoes would come in\nspring, and one side would be the red and white of the clover, and on\nthe other would be the minute blue flower of the flax; and an old dog\ndrowsing on the threshold.... And this would be in his mind as he\nwandered the hot foreign streets.... And there would be the droning of\nthe bees in the clover, and the swish of the swallows darting to and\nfrom the eaves, and in the evening would be the singing of the\ncrickets.... And these he would hear over the capstan's clank.... When\nhe tumbled into his cabin after his watch, into the heeling room where\nthe lamp swung overhead like a crazy thing, and all was a litter of\noilskins and sea-boots, and a great dampness everywhere, he would know\nthere was a swept cottage in Louth where the delft shone on the dresser\nin the kindly light of the turf, and there would be a spinning-wheel in\nthe corner, and big rush-bottomed chairs, and the kettle singing on the\nhob.... And when his comrades would leave the ship in port of nights to\ngo to the houses where music and dancing were, and crazy drinking, and\nwhere the adroit foreign women held out their arms of mystery and\nmercenary romance, he would lean over the taffrail and laugh and shake\nhis head:\n\n\"No, I think I'll stay on board.\" \"Come on, young Shane. There's a woman\ndown at Mother Parkinson's and they say she's an Austrian archduchess\nwho has run away with a man, and got left. Come on.\" Or, \"There's a big\ndance over on the beach to-night, and a keg of rum, and the native\nwomen. Jump in.\" \"No, I think I'll stay on board and read.\" \"Come on.\nDon't be a fool.\" \"No, go ahead and enjoy yourselves. I'll stay on\nboard.\" And there would be the plash of oars as they rowed shoreward,\nand maybe a song raised.... And he would make himself comfortable under\nthe awning of the after deck, and read the bundles of newspapers from\nhome, of how Thomas Chalmers, the great Scottish preacher, was dead, or\nhow a new great singer had been heard in London, a Swedish girl, her\nname was Jenny Lind, or how Shakspere's house had been bought and a\ngreat price paid for it, three thousand pounds.... Or he would read one\nof the new books that were coming out in a flood, a new one by Mr.\nDickens, the bite of the new writer, Mr. Thackeray with his \"Vanity\nFair,\" or that strange book written by a woman, \"Wuthering Heights\"....\nBut in a little minute the volume would fall to his knees, and the\npeople of the book would leave the platform of his mind, and a real,\nwarmer presence come to it.... He could see the gracious, kindly\nwomanhood now move through the house, now come to the door to watch the\nfar horizon.... Of evenings she would stand dreaming at the lintel while\nhe was leaning dreaming over the taffrail, and though there were ten\nthousand miles between them their hearts would be intimate as\npigeons.... And he would think of coming home to the peaceful cottage\nand the wife with the grave eyes and kindly smile, and if he were a day\nahead of time, she would forget her reserve in great joy, and low,\npleased laughter would jet from her throat.... And if he were on time,\nthere would be the quiet grave confidence: \"I knew your step!\" ... And\nif he were late, there would be the passing of the cloud from the brows:\n\"Thank God! I--I was--just a trifle worried!\" ... And the greetings\nover, she would look at him with a smile and a little lift of the\neyebrows, and he would give her what he had brought from the voyage: a\nring from Amsterdam, maybe, where the great jewelers are, or heavy\nsilken stockings of France; or had he gone to the West Indies, a great\nnecklet of red coral; or some fancy in humming-birds' feathers from the\nBrazils; lace from Porto Rico, that the colored women make with their\nslim brown fingers; things of hammered brass from India; and were he to\nChina in the tea-trade, a coat such as a mandarin's lady would wear....\nAnd with each gift there would be gasp of incredulous surprise, and \"O\nShaneen, you shouldn't have!\" ... And then the evening would come, and\nthey would stand on the threshold, and he would listen to the sounds the\nseamen never hear: the swish and ripple of the wind among the trees, the\nbirds settling themselves to sleep amid the boughs, the bittern that\nboomed like a horn, and the barking of a distant dog, and the crickets\nthat do be singing when the evening falls.... And he would turn from\nthat to find her arms out and her lips apart, who could wait no longer,\nand together they would go into their house, where the red turf had\nturned yellow--together, over their own threshold, into their own\nhouse.... And when the time came for him to go to sea again, she would\nbe grave with unshed tears and a brave smile.... And one day after a\nlong voyage, when she had greeted him, she would say, \"Some one has come\nto our house!\" and he wouldn't understand, and be annoyed, until she\nshowed him the little warm head in the cradle, and he would drop on his\nknees reverentially, and there would be great silent tears from him,\nand all her heart would show in her quiet smile....\n\nAnd never an old woman on Naples quay would ask him for an alms but\nwould get it, he thinking all the time of the old woman with the\ntow-like hair who abode in his house, his wife's mother. And she would\nbe comfortable there in her old days, with always a fire to warm her,\nand always a cup of tea to cheer her up, and a kindly ear for her\nstories of ancient days, and a thanks for the alien rosaries she would\nsay, praying for his safe return from the almighty waters.... And never\na dog on his travels but would get a pat and a whistle, and he thinking\nof the grizzled terrier in Louth that guarded the threshold of quiet\nbeauty....\n\nAnd so he would have been content to live all his days, so he thought he\nwould live, going down to the dangers of the sea, trading in strange\nports, and transmuting hard, untiring effort into gain for her at home\nand her children, and he would grow old and grizzled, until he could no\nlonger brace to a heeling plank or stand the responsibility of a ship's\nmastery, and then they would buy a little house on some harbor, while\ntheir sons went rolling down to Rio or fought the typhoon in the China\nSeas, and he could sit there with his telescope, watching the ships go\nby, or come in and out hauling up mainsail or making their mooring, and\ngrumbling pleasantly at how good seamanship fades and dies....\n\nAll this he had thought out in the loneliness of foreign ports, in the\nnight watches aboard ship, in the inhospitality of his mother's house,\nand on the jaunting-car to Dundalk. All this he had thought out, and on\nits basis gone into marriage. And it would just have been as well for\nhim, better perhaps, had he thrown a coin into the air to find out\nwhether he should marry or no.\n\nAnd that was what human thought was worth--a brown penny thrown into the\nempty air!\n\n\"_Gloir do'n Athair, agas do'n Mhac, agas do'n Spiorad Naomh_,\" went the\ndrone of the rosary within. \"Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and\nto the Holy Ghost, Amen!\"\n\n\nSection 10\n\nAnd the house that he had known in a dream was no more in reality than a\ncold strange dwelling; all was there, the whitewash, the thatch, the\ndelft on the dresser, but as a home it was stillborn. The turf did not\nburn well and the swallows shunned the eaves, feeling, in nature's\noccult way, that the essential rhythm was wanting. Nor would bees be\nhappy in the skips, but must swarm otherward. One would have said the\nhouse was built on some tragic rock....\n\nOnly the old dog was faithful, and stayed where his master put him.\n\nAnd the face he had dreamed would not look toward him over the\nillimitable ocean. Seek as he would, it was never there, with warm\ngravity. His eyes might strive, but all they would see was the oily\nswell of the Dogger Bank, and the great plowed field of Biscay Bay, and\nthe smash of foam against the Hebrides. Never would a space in the\nwatery horizon open and show him a threshold of beauty with quiet,\nbrooding face.... And when he came home, either late or early, or on\ntime to the moment, it was, \"Och, is it yourself?\" And the only\ninterruption to the house was the little more trouble he caused. And his\ngifts were treated tepidly, though with cupidinous eyes. In the evening,\nif he stood on the threshold, it was: \"Wisha, is it going out you are?\nAnd isn't it enough of the fresh air you have, and you on the salt\nwater?\" And her embraces were half chastity, half sin, tepidly\npassionate, unintimate ... so that shame was on him, and no pride or\njoyousness.... Cold! cold! cold!... A cold house, a cold woman.... No\nlight or warmth or graciousness....\n\nAnd the old woman whom he had thought of as warm and peaceful by the\nfire was a hag with a peasant's cupidity: \"And isn't it a little more\nyou can be leaving us, darling lad, what with the high price that does\nbe on things in this place and you not spending a brown ha'penny aboard\nship?... And herself might be taken sick now, and wouldn't it be a grand\nthing, a wee store of money in the house? Or the wars might come, find\nyou far on the sea! An extra sovereign now, brave fellow, a\nhalf-sovereign itself!\"\n\nAnd when he left it was of less import than the cow going dry. Only one\nmourned him, the old dog. Only one remembered him, the half-blind badger\nhound, that dreamed of ancient hunting days....\n\nAnd he would go down to his ship, heartbroken, when none was looking a\nmist of tears in his eyes,--he was not yet twenty-one,--but in a day or\nso that would pass, and the sea that was so strong would give him of its\nstrength and heal him, so that after a few days he could stand up and\nsay: \"Well.... Huuh.... Well....\"\n\nA trick had been played him, like some tricks the sea and sun play. Afar\noff he had seen an island like an appointed dancing place, like the\nGreen of Fiddlers, and he had asked to be put ashore there, to live and\nbe a permanent citizen. And when he was landed, he found that his\ndancing place was only a barren rock where the seagulls mourned. Past\nthe glamour of the sun and sea mists, there were only cold, searching\nwinds and dank stone....\n\nBut he came of a race that are born men, breed men, and kill men. Crying\nnever patched a hole in a brogue, and a man who's been fooled is no\nadmirable figure, at least to Antrim men. So shut your mouth! When a\nmaster loses a ship he gets no other. That is the inexorable rule of the\nsea. So when a man wrecks his life....\n\nWhat he had decided was this: go ahead. He had been fooled; pay the\nforfeit. Retreat into his own heart, and go ahead. Thirty, forty\nyears.... He had himself to blame. And it wasn't as if he had to live in\nthe house all the time; he had only to come back there. All that was\nkilled was his heart. His frame was still stolid, his eye clear....\nThere would be little oases here and there, some great record of a\nvoyage broken, friends bravely made, a kiss now and then, freely,\ngallantly given.... But ... go ahead!\n\nAnd then suddenly death had come, and the scheme of life was broken,\nlike a piece from the end of a stick. Death he had seen before, but\nnever so close to him. A good man had died and he had said: \"God!\nthere's a pity!\" though why he didn't know. And a young girl might die,\nand it would seem like a tragedy in a play. And a child would die, and\nhe would feel hurt and say, \"Yon's cruelty, yon!\" And death had seemed\nto be an ultimate word.\n\nBut never before now had he seen the ramifications of death. Life had\nseemed to him to be a straight line, and suddenly he was inspired to the\nknowledge that it was a design, a pattern, a scheme.... And now he felt\nit was only a tool, like a knife, or scissors, in the hands of what?...\nWhat? Destiny?... or what?...\n\n\nSection 11\n\n\"_A chraoibhin aoibhinn!_ O pleasant little branch, is there regard in\nyou for the last words of the dead woman?\" The old _cailleach_ had come\nagain to ruffle the grave silence about young Shane in the haggard.\n\n\"Was it--was it anything for me?\"\n\n\"And whom would it be for, _acushla veg?_ Sure the love of her heart\nyou were, the white love of her heart. You and me she was thinking of,\nher old mother that saw a power of trouble. Ill-treated I was by\nSergeant Dolan, who fought old Bonaparte in the foreign wars, and took\nto drinking in the dreadful days of peace. Harsh my life was, and\npeaceful should my end be, the like of a day that does be rainy, and\nturns fine at evening-time. And that was what she wanted, _a charaid\nbhig_, little friend o' me.\"\n\n\"What now?\"\n\n\"She said to me, and she dying in my arms and the blue spirit coming out\nof the red lips of her--och! achanee!--'Sure it's not in that grand\nNorthern lad to see you despised in your old age, and the grannies of\nthe neighborhood laughing at you who boasted often. The wee house he'll\ngive you--the wee house is comfortable for an old woman--'\"\n\n\"But the house isn't mine. It's Alan Donn Campbell's. It isn't mine to\ngive, and I haven't the money to buy it. All the money I have is my pay\nand what my uncles give me--and they won't see you want.\"\n\n\"But isn't it the grand rich Northern family you are? And won't there be\nmoney coming to you when your uncles and mother die?\"\n\n\"I suppose so.\"\n\n\"Well now, agra, a few of us have been thinking. And Manus McGinty, the\npriest's brother, is willing to advance you the money at interest, to be\npaid him when your people die. And you can buy the house, and a slip of\na pig I can be fattening against the Christmas market.\"\n\n\"No!\"\n\n\"Och, agra,\" she whined, \"you wouldn't go back on the words of the poor\ngirl, and her dying in my arms? And she was thinking of you when she\nshould have been thinking of her God! And the grand subtle things she\nsaid of you, that only a woman can understand! Sure it was of love for\nyou she died, you being away so long from her on the salt and bitter\nsea--\"\n\n\"Listen, woman Dolan. I heard how Moyra died as I came through the\nvillage. She died as she was beating my poor old hound. She dropped dead\nfrom the passion in her, like a shot man. So where's all your love and\nyour long dying wishes as she lay in your arms?\"\n\nHe arose and walked away from her, through the haggard, under the sky,\nwhere the southeast cloud-banks rolled steadily toward the placid moon.\nAnd there was silence for an instant, so speechless he left her. And\nthen suddenly her ancient shrill voice cut the air like a drover's\nwhip:\n\n\"You Orange bastard!\"\n\n\nSection 12\n\nThe feeling that was uppermost in him as he sat outside the thatched\ncottage in the moonlight while the wake was within was not grief at his\nwife's death; not a shattered mind that his life so carefully laid out\nnot twelve months before was disoriented; not any self-pity; not any\ngrievance against God such as little men might have. But a strange dumb\nwonder.... There she lay within, in her habit of a Dominican lay sister,\nher hands waxy, her face waxy, her eyelids closed. And six guttering\ncandles were about her, and woman droned their prayers with a droning as\nof bees. There she lay with her hands clasped on a wooden crucifix. And\nno more would the robins wake her, and they fussing in the great\nhawthorn-tree over the coming of dawn. No longer would she rake the ash\nfrom the peat and blow the red of it to a little blaze. No longer would\nshe beat his dog out of the house with the handle of the broom. No\nlonger would she forgather with the neighbors over a pot of tea for a\npleasant vindictive chat. No longer would she look out to sea for him\nwith her half-loving, half-inimical eyes. No longer in her sharpish\nvoice would she recite her rosary and go to bed.\n\nAnd to-morrow they would bury her--there would be rain to-morrow: the\nwind was sou'east,--they would lower her, gently as though she were\nalive, into a rectangular slot in the ground, mutter alien prayers in an\nalien tongue with business of white magic, pat the mound over as a child\npats his castle of sand on the sea-shore--and leave her there in the\nrain.\n\nA month from now they would say a mass for her, a year from now another,\nbut to-morrow, to-day, yesterday even, she was finished with all of\nlife--with the fussy excited robins of dawn; with the old dog that\nwanted to drowse by the fire; with the young husband who was either too\nmuch or too little of a man for her; with the clicking beads she would\ntell in her sharpish voice; with each thing; with everything....\n\nAnd here was the wonder of it, the strange dumb wonder, that the\nsnapping of her life meant less in reality to him than the snapping of a\nstay aboard ship. The day after to-morrow he would mount the deck of\nPatrick Russell's boat, and after a few crisp orders would set out on\nthe eternal sea, as though she were still alive in her cottage, as\nthough, indeed, she had never even lived, and northward he would go past\nthe purple Mull of Cantyre; past the Clyde, where the Ayrshire sloops\ndanced like bobbins on the water; past the isles, where overhead drove\nthe wedges of the wild swans, trumpeting as on a battle-field; past the\nHebrides, where strange arctic birds whined like hurt dogs; northward\nstill to where the northern lights sprang like dancers in the black\nwinter nights; eastward and southward to where the swell of the Dogger\nBank rose, where the fish grazed like kine.... Over the great sea he\nwould go, as though nothing had happened, not even the snapping of a\nstay--down to the sea, where the crisp winds of dawn were, and the\nplayful, stupid, short-sighted porpoises; the treacherous, sliding\nicebergs; and the gulls that cried with the sea's immense melancholy;\nand the great plum-colored whales....\n\n\n\n\nPART THREE\n\nTHE MOUTH OF HONEY\n\n\nSection 1\n\nIt was all like a picture some painter of an old and obvious school\nmight have done. First, there was the port, with the white ships riding\nat their moorings in the blue sea. Then grayish white Marseilles, with\nits two immense ribbons, the Cannebiere running northward, and the Rue\nde Rome and the Prado intersecting it. The great wooded amphitheater\nrising like a wave and little Notre Dame de la Garde peeking like a\nsentry out to sea. And eastward from the quays were the little jagged\nislands the Phenicians knew, If, and Rion, Jaros, strange un-French\nnames ... the sunshine yellow as a lamp, and the sea blue as flax, and\nthe green woods, and the ancient grayish white city--all a picture some\nunimaginative painter would have loved. Next to Belfast, Marseilles was\nto Shane Campbell a second home. There it was, like your own house!\n\nObvious and drowsy it might seem, but once he went ashore, the swarming,\nteeming life of it struck Shane like a current of air. Along the quays,\nalong the Cannebiere, was a riot of color and nationality unbelievable\nfrom on board ship. Here were Turks dignified and shy. Here were Greeks,\nwary, furtive. Here were Italians, Genoese, Neapolitans, Livonians,\ndroll, vivacious, vindictive. Here were Moors, here were Algerians,\nblack African folk, sneering, inimical. Here were Spaniards, with their\nwalk like a horse's lope. Here were French business men, very important.\nHere were Provencals, cheery, short, tubby, excitable, olive-colored,\nblack-bearded, calling to one another in the _langue d'oc_ of the\ntroubadours, _\"Te, mon bon! Commoun as? Quezaco?\"_\n\nAnd the bustle of the shops and the bustle of cafes, until Shane was\nforced to go out to the olive-lined roads to the rocky summit of La\nGarde, and once there, as if drawn by a magnet, Shane would enter the\nchapel in the fort, where the most renowned Notre Dame of the\nMediterranean smiles mawkishly in white olive-wood. After the blinding\nsun of the Midi, the cool dark chapel was like a dungeon to him, so\nlittle could he see anything; but in a while the strange furniture of\nthe place would take form before his eyes: the white statue of the\nVirgin, the silver tunny-fish, the daubs of sea hazards whence the\nVirgin had rescued grateful mariners, the rope-ends, the crutches....\nAnd though none might be in the chapel, yet it was full of life, so much\ndid the pathetic ex-votos tell.... And he would come out of the chapel,\nand again the Midi sun would flash in a shower of gold, and he could see\nthe blue Mediterranean, pricked with minute lateen-sails, and the\ngrayish town beneath him, so old and yet so vital, and the calm harbor,\nwith the forest of spars, and Monte Cristo, white as an egg....\n\nA queer town that, as familiar as a channel marking, teeming as an\nant-hill, and when darkness came over it, and he viewed it from the\nafter deck, mystery came, too.... For a while there was a hush, and\naround the hills gigantic ghosts walked.... One thought of the Phocaeans\nwho had founded it, and to whom the Cannebiere was a rope-walk, where\nthey made the sheets for their ships.... And one thought of Lazarus, who\nhad been raised from among the silent dead and who had come there, so\nlegend read, a gray figure in ceramic garments, standing in the prow of\na boat....\n\nOne thing Robin More had told him remained in his mind and captured his\nfancy, and that was that Pontius Pilate had been governor of Marseilles\nafter his office in Judea. And of him Shane would think when the\nmysterious dusk came on the Midi hills ... Pilate, who had smiled, \"What\nis truth?\" and who had turned Christ over to the mob.... A big man, he\nimagined the Roman to have been, with clever eyes, and a great black\nbeard covering a weak chin.... A man who knew all the subtleties of\nmind, and had no backbone.... And he could see the Roman, sitting on his\nvilla porch in the dusk with tortured eyes, and fingering his beard with\nfingers that shook.... Paul was going through Greece and Rome like a\nflame, and the Pilate wondered.... Could it have been possible?...\nRidiculous! a Jewish carpenter! A crazy man!.... And yet.... Could it\nhave been possible.... No! no! no! And yet.... People had seen Him walk\non the waves.... But people never knew what they saw, exactly.... No!\nHow foolish!... He raised a man from the dead they said.... And that\ncenturion--what was his name?--his daughter!... No, a stupid Jewish\nlegend.... And yet.... Could it be possible? Could it? Could it?\n\n\"Lights! Lights! Do you hear me! Bring lights! Lights!\" Pilate would all\nbut scream, panic-stricken in the Midi dusk....\n\nTo Shane Campbell Marseilles had been all this for two years while he\njourneyed from Liverpool for silk and scented soaps--a landmark\nfamiliar as the Giant's Causeway, a strange, motley human circus, a veil\nbehind which hid gigantic ghosts.... Until he met _La Mielleuse_ on the\nroad to Aix.\n\n\nSection 2\n\nFor six years now, since the day they had buried his wife in the green\ndivots of Louth, women had been alien to him. It was not that he hated\nthem, not that he was uncomfortable among them; but the thought of close\nmental or spiritual or physical contact with them put him in a panic, as\none might be in a panic at the thought of contact with some Chinaman, or\nEskimo. The women of the better class in ports importuned him, but he\npassed with a grave humorous smile and an unexpected courtesy. His\nfriends' wives or acquaintances could get nothing out of him but a grave\nanswer to any questions they might put, so that they characterized him\nas a stick. And at home in Ulster, whither he went after occasional\nvoyages, where Robin More still drowsed over his books; where Alan Donn\nstill hunted and fished and golfed, haler at five and fifty than a boy\nin his early twenties; and where his mother sat and did beautiful\nbroidery, dumbly, inimically, cold as a fish, secretive as a badger,\nthere he would meet the women of the Antrim families, women who knew of\nthe disaster of his marriage, and they would look approvingly at his\nfirm face and smiling, steady eyes, and they would say: \"A man, thon! He\ncould be a good friend. You could trust him, a woman could.\" They were\nunco good folk, Antrim folk.\n\nFor the peasant girls around he had always a laugh and a joke. And for\nthe young girls from school he had always a soft spot in his heart\nsomehow, appreciating them as one appreciates the first primrose or a\npuppy dog playing on the lawn or the lark in the clear air. There came\nsuch a current of beauty and freshness from them.... New from the hand\nof the Maker.... They were pausing now, as the wind pauses on the\ntide.... And in a little while the world, the damned world!... And so he\ntreated them with a great gravity, answering their questions on\ngeography, telling them what an estuary was, and what the trade-winds,\nand how a typhoon came and paused and passed: and how jute and grain and\nindigo were taken from Calcutta, and of the Hooghly, the most difficult\nriver in the world to navigate, and of the shoal called \"James and\nMary\".... And they listened to him with wide-open, violet eyes....\n\nAnd there were two women, Leah Fraser, a slight woman with hair smooth\nand reddish like a gold coin, and eyes that thought and saw back of\nthings, and slender, beautiful hands, and she moved with the dignity of\na swan.... And there was Anne MacNeill, who handled a horse as a man\nwould, and was a great archer--she could shoot as far as Alan could\ndrive a golf-ball with a spoon.... Shane could always see her, a Diana\non the greensward, leaning forward, listening to hear the smack of the\narrow on the target.... And both these women were his good friends, the\nthought of them filling his mind like sweet lavender.... But when they\nwere each alone with him, and a little silence would come, then panic\nwould fall on him, and he would make an undignified escape from their\ncompany proffering any old excuse.... And they would watch him go, with\nlittle twisted smiles.... Poor Leah! Poor Anne!\n\nAll the love in him, that some sweet, gracious woman should have had,\nwas anesthetized, or it was deflected, perhaps, to the great\nthree-masted schooner he was now owner and master of, a beautiful boat\nthat had been christened the _Ulster Lady_, and came from the yards at\nBelfast, taking the water as nobly as a swan. From truck to keelson\nthere was no part of her imperfect; from stem to stern. Barring a little\ntendency to be cranky before the wind in a seaway, nothing better\nsailed. Jammed, or on the wind, she was like a hare before the hounds,\nso quickly did she go. Her slim black body, her white, beautifully set\nsails--not a strake or an inch of canvas on her that he did not know and\nlove. And more thought was given by him to the proper peaking of a spar\nand the exact setting of a leech than to the profits of the cargo. It\nwas like having one's own country, and his cabin aboard was like his own\ncastle--the little stateroom with the swinging-lamps, and the compass\nabove the fastened bed, the row of books, the Aberdeen terrier, _Duine\nUasal_, who slept peacefully on the rug, and who would go on deck and\nsniff the wind like a connoisseur.... And there was a manuscript poem of\nhis father's in the Irish letter, _Leaba Luachra_, \"The Bed of Rushes,\"\nwhich he had discovered and had framed. And there was a prized thing of\nhis boyhood there, a dagger the Young Pretender wore in his stocking,\nand he in Highland dress, as he swung toward London with pipe and drum.\nAlan Donn had given it to him, and he after getting it on a visit to\nArgyll. \"Not only is it Charlie's, but it's a nice handy thing, thon!\"\n... A beautiful piece of work it was, perfectly balanced, keen as a\nrazor, with a handle of the stag's horn.... It was the only weapon Shane\nhad, and about it curled romance and the smoke of dead, royal hopes....\nA bonny, homy place that cabin, peaceful as a garden of bees, when the\nwater slipped past the beam. It was like a warm hearth-fire to come down\nthere after a strenuous time on deck while the sou'wester crashed on the\nWelsh coast. Or in the roll of the Bay of Biscay, after a space watching\nthe swinging fields of stars, to come down there was to drop into a\nwelcoming circle of friends, to throw one's self down and pick up a\nbook, the Laureate's \"In Memoriam\" or Mr. Thackeray's latest--and to\nglance from the pages of \"Henry Esmond\" to Prince Charlie's dagger lying\npeacefully on the desk.... How near! how near!... And up forward the\nlookout paced, or leaned over the bows, humming in Gaidhlig:\n\n_'S tric me sealtuinn do'n chnoc is airde D'fheac a faic mi fear a bhata\nAn dtig tu andiu no'n dtig tu 'maireach? Is mur dtig tu eader gur truagh\nmar ta mi!_\n\n  Will you come to-day or will you come to-morrow?\n  If you never come how piteous for me!\n  _Fhir a' bhata, na horo eile!_\n    _Hi horo, fhir a bhata--_\n\nAll the nostalgia of the Scottish isles was in the minors of that\nsong.... And it was like a lullaby.... And the wind hummed through the\nrigging.... And underneath was the flow and throb of the immense\ncirculation of the sea.... And overhead the helmsman rang the ship's\nbell. _Tung-tung, tung-tung, tung-tung, tung._ And all was well on board\nthe _Ulster Lady_. And she was his only sweetheart and delight ... until\nhe met _La Mielleuse_ on the road to Aix....\n\n\nSection 3\n\nThe babble of the Greek merchants in the Cafe Turc at last began to bore\nhim, and hiring a horse and sort of gig he decided to drive to Aix. He\nhad always wished to see the old Provencal capital, but somehow the\nopportunity had always passed by, or something.... But on this bright\nSeptember afternoon it seemed such a pity to go back on board ship....\nHe examined the old white horse with interest.\n\n\"Are you sure he'll take me there? You see his--\" Shane wanted to say\nsuspensory ligaments, but his French didn't quite go that far--\"his\nlegs--\"\n\n\"But, Monsieur, he has won several races--\"\n\n\"Well, in that event\"--Shane grinned, \"K-k-k-k!\"\n\nThe white horse trotted steadily out the Prado, the Rue de Rome, trotted\nout in the country, passed Bains de la Mediterranee. A northerdly breeze\nwas out rippling the gulf and giving promise of autumn, and the heavy\nheat of the Midi had disappeared for the instant. Soon they would be\nplucking the grapes of Provence. The olive-trees were black on the white\nroad. The white horse trotted on....\n\nThere were peasants on the road going into town, and townspeople going\nout to the country.... And children who insulted one another shrilly....\nBut the white horse plodded on. On a stretch of level road he passed a\npair talking, noting casually that the woman was a lady from her\ncarriage, and from his threatening cringe that the man was a cad.\nItalian riff-raff of some kind....\n\n\"But you are mistaken,\" the woman was saying. \"You are making an error.\"\n\nThe man's reply was low, inaudible.\n\n\"But I assure you, you are mistaken.\"\n\nThe white horse plodded on.\n\n\"Please, please\"--the woman's voice followed Shane, and there was\nembarrassed fear in it--\"please let me pass! You are mistaken.\"\n\nAnd then again: \"I swear to you ... please ... please!\"\n\nThe white horse was surprised at a firm pull on his mouth, a crack of\nthe whip, and a turn.... He broke in a lolloping canter.... Shane jumped\ndown....\n\n\"Madame, is this man annoying you?\"\n\n\"_Sirvase, Signor_--\"\n\nBut one look at the woman's face was sufficient. Shane turned on the\nfawning Sicilian with a snarl.\n\n\"Get to hell out of here, quick!\" The man shuffled off, walked quickly,\nran, disappeared....\n\nThe great dark eyes had agony in them. Her mouth quivered. Shane knew\nher knees were shaking as she stood.\n\n\"Better get in here. I'll drive you home.\" He helped her into the trap.\n\"I ought to have held that fellow,\" he grumbled. \"Marseilles? No! Oh,\nLes Bains! We'll be there in a minute. You're all right now, Madame.\"\n\n\"He mistook me--for--somebody else--\" She had a voice deep and sweet as\na bell, but there was a tremor in it now--a marked accent of fear,\npast, but not recovered from.\n\nHe was aware of a great vibrant womanhood beside him, as some people are\naware of spirits in a room, or a mother is aware of a child. He was\naware, though he hardly saw them, though he didn't know he saw them, of\nthe proud Greek beauty of her face, so decisively, so finely chiseled,\nso that it seemed to soar forward, as a bird soars into the wind; of the\nfirm, dark ellipsis of the eyebrows; of the mouth that quivered, and yet\nin repose would be something for a master of line and color to draw; the\nlittle hands that plucked nervously at the dark silk gown, unquiet as\nbutterflies. Her eyes, he knew, were wide with fear, great black pupils,\ndeep, immensely deep. And he was aware, too, of something within her\nthat vibrated, as a stay aboard ship vibrates in a gusty, angry wind, or\nas an ill-plucked harpstring will vibrate to and fro, unable to stop.\n\n\"I live here, Monsieur.\"\n\nIt was a little white villa, with green jalousies such as the Midi has\nin thousands. He pulled up, and she was down before he could help her.\nHer face was quiet now but for the tremor of her eyes.\n\n\"Thank you ever so much,\" she said.\n\n\"But this man, Madame. Are you safe? Ought not one to--the police?\"\n\n\"It was nothing, Monsieur.\" She laughed, but her voice still quivered.\n\"Some good-for-nothing who took me for some one else, whom he had seen\nsomewhere else, and knew--something--about. Nothing at all, a bagatelle,\nthat might happen to any one. But I thank you so much! You were going\nsomewhere?\"\n\n\"To Aix, Madame.\"\n\n\"But your horse is lame!\"\n\n\"So he is, poor old boy! I hadn't noticed.\"\n\n\"Then--_adieu, Monsieur_. And thanks again.\"\n\nHe drove back to town. \"I shall never get to Aix,\" he thought. \"Perhaps\nI shouldn't go.... Some fate....\" At the livery post he got down and\nexamined the horse's fetlock.\n\n\"So you won several races, eh?\" But the white horse seemed to shake its\nhead. \"No! Oh, well, no matter, old codger!\" And he stroked the long\nlugubrious muzzle....\n\nAnd thus, casually as he would light a match for his cigarette, casually\nas he would stumble over something, casually as he would pick up a book,\nhe met _La Mielleuse_ on the road to Aix....\n\n\nSection 4\n\nFor days now he had been aware of her presence in Marseilles without\nthinking of her--aware of her as he was aware of the Hotel de Ville, or\nof the Consigne, as of the obelisk in the Place Castellane. These things\nwere facts, had their place, and she was a fact. She had become\nimprinted on his memory as on a sensitive plate. So one dusk on the\nPrado, as he met her, he was no more surprised than if, in their\nappointed places he had come across the obelisk or the Consigne or the\nHotel de Ville.\n\nShe was standing looking out to sea, and the little wind from Africa\nblew against her, and made her seem poised for flight, like a bird.\n\nAnd because he saw no reason why he shouldn't and because he was direct\nand simple as the sea itself, he went to her.\n\n\"Are you a sea-captain's wife?\"\n\n\"No, Monsieur.\" She seemed to know him without turning. Perhaps she\nrecognized his voice.\n\n\"I saw you looking out toward the Pharo. I thought perhaps you were\nwaiting for some one to come home on a ship.\"\n\n\"No,\" she said slowly. \"No. I--I come here some dusks, and look out to\nsea. There is something. It seems to pull me. The great waters and the\nblinking lighthouse--I seem to stand out of myself. And miles and miles\nand miles away there is a new land with a new life where one might go\n... and begin.... What is in me seems to struggle to go out there, but\nit never gets more than an inch or so outside. But even that.... And the\nwind ... so clean. Are you a sailor?\"\n\n\"Yes, I am a sailor.\"\n\n\"It is very beautiful and very pure, the sea?\"\n\n\"Yes, sometimes it is very beautiful. I think it is always beautiful.\nAnd it must be pure--I never thought.... It is strong, and sometimes\ncruel. It heals, and sometimes it is very lonely. One never quite\nunderstands. It is so big.\"\n\n\"Yes, so big and strong ... and it heals. One seems, one's self, one's\nlittle cares, to be so little.\"\n\nAnd they were silent for a while.\n\n\"But perhaps I intrude, Madame. Your husband----\"\n\n\"My husband is dead in Algiers these six years.\"\n\n\"I am sorry.\"\n\nEverything was hushed, the tideless sea, the silent wind. Behind them,\nand still about them, hung the strange dusk of Pontius Pilate. Before\nthem blazed Marseilles.\n\n\"You are married?\"\n\n\"I was married.\"\n\n\"Then your wife is--dead?\"\n\n\"Yes, Madame, she is dead.\"\n\n\"You grieve?\"\n\n\"No, I do not grieve.\"\n\n\"Did you not love her?\"\n\n\"I loved some one I thought was she. It wasn't she.\"\n\nThere was another instant's silence as they walked.\n\n\"Ah, I think I understand,\" she said. And they walked into the blaze of\nthe city. She paused for a moment.\n\n\"Will you pardon me for asking things like that? I don't usually.... But\nin the dusk I seem to be another person....\"\n\n\"No. In the light we are other persons.\"\n\n\"Ah,\" she smiled understandingly. \"You are going to your ship now?\"\n\nThere was a finality in her voice. It was more an affirmation than a\nquestion.\n\n\"Madame,\" Shane said, \"will you please let me see you to your door?\"\n\nShe looked at him for an intense second, and a little cloud of--was it\nfear?--flitted across her face.\n\n\"Madame, there are thieves and villains of all kinds abroad. You have\nhad one experience. Please let me protect you from a possible second.\"\n\n\"If you wish.\" She smiled. He called a carriage.\n\nIn the light she was a different person. Along the sea-shore walking in\nthe dusk, she was a troubled phantom, a thing of beauty, but without\nflesh, without the trappings of clothes--as if a spirit had been\nimprisoned in cold white statuary. But now she was a beautiful woman,\ngravely gay, a woman of the world, not of the great world, perhaps, and\nnot of the half-world--just a woman aware of and experienced in life.\nAnd poised.\n\n\"You are English?\"\n\n\"Not English. Irish.\"\n\nPoised she was, but she was like a player playing a game, and the breaks\nagainst her. He knew the smile. He had seen it often on Alan Donn's\nface, playing in some of the great title matches. Four holes to go, and\nhe must better par. It's all right, the smile said; there's nothing\nwrong. But in Alan Donn's was the glint of a naked knife, and in this\nwoman's eyes, down deep, veiled, but ill concealed, was appeal.\n\n[Illustration]\n\nThey stopped at her house. He helped her out.\n\n\"_Adieu, Monsieur_. And again a thousand thanks.\"\n\n\"_C'etait un vrai plaisir!_\"\n\n\"Monsieur!\"\n\n\"Madame!\"\n\nThe cabman looked surprised when ordered to return. He turned and\nregarded his fare with amazement.\n\n\"_Quai de la Fraternite_,\" I said.\n\n\"_Hup, alors!_\" The cabby shrugged his shoulders. And they trotted\nploddingly through the dusk of Pontius Pilate to the burning cloud which\nwas Marseilles....\n\n\nSection 5\n\nHe knew he should meet her again, and where he should meet her, and he\ndid, on the Prado. He knew when. In the Midi dusk. A touch of mistral\nwas out, and the wind blew seaward. She was sitting down, looking toward\nAfrica.\n\n\"You oughtn't to come out here alone,\" he said. \"Marseilles is a bad\nport.\"\n\n\"I know,\" she said. \"I know. But it draws me, this spot. You leave\nsoon?\" she asked.\n\n\"In a few days.\"\n\n\"But you will be back.\"\n\n\"Yes, I will be back,\" he told her. \"I don't know why, but I think I'd\nrather die than not see Marseilles again. It is a second home, and yet I\nknow so few people here.\"\n\n\"If one has the temperament, and conditions are--as they should\nbe--Marseilles is wonderful.\"\n\n\"One could be happy here.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" and she sighed.\n\nThe spell of the archaic dusk came on him again; a dusk old as the\nworld. About them brooded the welter of passion and romance that\nMarseilles is. Once it was a Phocaean village, and hook-nosed Afric folk\nhad stepped through on long, thin feet. And then had come the Greeks,\nwith their broad, clear brows, their gray eyes. And further back the\nhairy Gauls had crept, snarling like dogs. And Greece died. And came the\nclash of the Roman legions, ruthless fighting hundreds, who saw, did\nmassive things. And Rome died. And over the sea came the Saracens, their\nhigh heads, their hard, bronzed bodies, their scarlet mouths. And they\nconquered and builded and lived.... And were hurled back.... Years\nhummed by, and passion died not, or romance, and it was from Marseilles\nthat a battalion had come to Paris gates singing the song that Rouget de\nLisle had written in Strasburg:\n\n  _Allons, enfants de la Patrie,\n    Le jour de gloire est arrive._\n\nAnd passed that day, and came another, when a handful of grizzled\nveterans left the gates to join their brothers and meet the exiled\nemperor.... Passion and romance! Their colors were in Marseilles\nstill.... Over in _Anse des Catalans_ weren't there the remains of the\nvillage of the sea-Gipsies, who had come none knew whence?... And along\nthe gulf there were settlements of Saracen blood--_les Maures_, the\nProvencals called them ... and the shadow of Pontius Pilate wild-eyed in\nthe dusk....\n\n\"It's strange\"--her voice came gently to him,--\"but I can hear you\nthink.\"\n\n\"And I can feel your silence,\" he said. \"Just feel--you--being silent--\"\n\nThe wind whipped up, grew shrill, grew cold. She shivered in her thin\nfrock.\n\n\"You are becoming cold.\"\n\n\"I am cold.\"\n\n\"Then hadn't you better go home--to your house?\"\n\nShe rose silently. It seemed to him somehow that she had put herself\nunder his care. She was like some gentle little craft that had anchored\nhumbly under the lee of a great ship. He felt somehow that she was a\nthing to be protected. He hailed a carriage, and she made no\nprotest--all the time under his lee, so needful of protection. It was a\nshock when they came into the lights of Marseilles to find a proud,\ngrave woman there and not a shrinking, wide-eyed child.... Her face,\npoised for flight, like a bird's wing; the beautiful, half-opened mouth,\nthe hands, the little feet in their shoes. She was like some beautiful\nshy deer. And somewhere hovered disaster, like a familiar spirit.... And\nyet she was smiling....\n\nAt the door he made to bid her good-by.\n\n\"Would you--would you care to come in?\"\n\n\"Why--why, yes.\" He sent the carriage away.\n\nHe followed her up the path to the little villa and with her entered the\nhouse. There were no servants to answer the door; she let herself in\nwith a latch-key, but so scrupulously clean was the place, so furnished\nin its way, that there must have been servants somewhere. The\nliving-room into which she conducted him was spacious and a little bare,\nthough not bare for the Midi--a plain white room, high in the ceiling,\nwith chairs of good line. Here was a big piano, here a fireplace, here a\nfew paintings, colorful landscapes, on the wall. Together they lit\ncandles.\n\n\"Back of here is a garden,\" she said, \"where I spend most of the day.\nAnd I have a cook\"--she smiled--\"and a maid who waits on me. And yet I\ngo out to walk on the Prado....\"\n\nShane wasn't surprised. It wasn't home, somehow. The room was like a\nsetting in a play, here light, here shadow.... The paintings, the\ninstrument of music, the chairs, they were not things owned and loved.\nThey were properties.... In the golden candle-light, as she moved, she\nwas like an actress of great restraint. Every step, posture, gesture\nseemed to have an occult significance. Even her bedroom, away off\nsomewhere, he felt, was not a place where one slept easily and dreamed.\nIt would be like the dressing-room of some woman mummer.... It was all\nlike a play, of which he was seeing a fragment from the wings.... What\nwas it all about? Who was she? And why was his heart a-flutter?\n\nShe had taken off her hat, and her hair was coiled close about her\nexquisite head. White and black, regular, significant, antique--like a\ncameo of some Greek woman, long dead. She stood by a little table, one\nhand on it, the other like some butterfly against her gown.... It was\nlike a pose--but unconscious, he knew, utterly unconscious....\n\n\"Tell me,\" she said, \"why did you speak to me?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" he said, \"I just spoke.\"\n\n\"You weren't\"--her words were weighty, picked--\"looking for a flirtation\nwith a pretty woman?\"\n\n\"Why, no. Of course not,\" he answered. \"I never thought--\"\n\n\"No. No, you didn't.\" She decided for herself.\n\nShe came toward him suddenly in the candle-light. Stood before him.\n\n\"Tell me, who are you? What are you?\" There was a tragic appeal in her\nface. \"Where do you come from? Where are you going?\"\n\n\"I don't know.\" His throat was dry, his heart pounding. \"A few days ago\nI was a contented man, unhappy but contented. And now I don't know.\"\n\n\"And I don't know who I am.\" Her mouth quivered. \"I am two people--three\npeople.\"\n\nThey looked at each other with a sort of agony, as though they had lost\nsomething dear to each, and to both of them. They were immensely\nintimate. He put out his hand....\n\n\"Poor ... poor....\"\n\nTheir hands touched, and there seemed to rush between them, through\nthem, some powerful current; and how it happened he did not know, but\nthey were kissing each other.... He thought with a queer shock, was a\nwoman's mouth so soft, so sweet, so vibrant? He hadn't known. And was he\nkissing her? And how had it happened? It was impossible!... Or was he\ndreaming?... Or was he--was he dead?...\n\nShe released herself from him for an instant, putting her hands on his\nshoulders, her eyes looking into his eyes....\n\n\"What is your name?\"\n\n\"Campbell. Shane Campbell.\"\n\n\"Campbell. Shane Campbell. Shane--Shane Campbell. Mine is\nClaire-Anne--Claire-Anne Godey.\"\n\n\nSection 6\n\nIt seemed to him as he went to Les Bains that next evening that the\nworld had somehow changed into another dimension, so much clearer the\nair was, so much brighter the stars.... He had discovered a higher, more\nrarefied stratum of life, in the dim, keen atmosphere of which things\ntook on incomparable beauty and mystery, so that the water on his left\nhand, unseen, yet so blue, was not the Gulf of Lyons, but the whole\nMediterranean, which washed Genoa and Naples and Sicily, and the little\nislands of the Greeks, and the barbaric shores of Africa, Morocco, and\nAlgiers; and Gibraltar, where the English were, like an armed sentry in\na turret. The ships in the harbor were not ships of commerce, but\nstately entities, each whispering to each in the _shush-shush_ of water\nand wind, telling of the voyages they had made, adventurous as\nsturgeons. Even from the mud-and-rush huts along the sea-shore came the\nnote of brave romance. And the softly singing trees! And in the great\namphitheater of the woods no longer the shade of Pontius Pilate gnawed\nhis bitten nails, but more gallant presences were, gray-eyed Greek\nwomen, with proud composed faces and eloquent hands, and Saracens calmly\nawaiting the morrow's battle, and troubadours puzzling keenly for a\nrime.... They were not colored thoughts, but sentient presences. Spirit\nand thought had united in him into a being like a bird, leaving the\nearth, and flying into a realm of ancient forgotten beauty, spirit being\nthe will, and thought the vibrating wing.... How harmonious everything\nwas, the stars, the earth, the sea, the people! How clear it had all\nbecome! How one!...\n\nHe came to her in her garden where she sat beneath a tree. Around, the\ncicadas whirred in the speaking trees. _Zig-zig-zig-zig._ But they were\nno longer strident. They seemed but a vibration of the high atmosphere\nin which he was....\n\n\"Claire-Anne! Claire-Anne....\"\n\n\"Yes ... yes, lover....\"\n\n\"Claire-Anne!\"\n\nShe stood up as he took her lovely, pale hands. There was no shame to\nher glance, nothing but a wonderful frankness, her eyes going to his\nlike brave winged things.\n\n\"Claire-Anne, I want to ask you something.\"\n\n\"Yes ... Lover....\"\n\n\"Claire-Anne, when will you marry me?\"\n\nHer hands never quivered, but he was aware that her mouth did, in the\nhigh diluted starlight.\n\n\"Why do you want to marry me? Is it because ...? Do you feel bound?...\nor ... just why?\"\n\n\"I want to be with you, Claire-Anne.\"\n\n\"Then--dearest, does it matter to go before the mayor and arrange about\nproperty? And to go before a priest and make promises--to God!... Sit\ndown, lover; sit down with me here, in the dusk, under the tree.\"\n\nShe still clasped both his hands. He might have been talking to some\nbeautiful disembodied spirit, as Pontius Pilate was a poor\npanic-stricken spirit, or to something he had conjured out of his head,\nbut for her firm, warm hands. To-night it was she had strength....\n\n\"Dearest, promises are so easy to make. I have made promises, oh, so\nmany promises!... And life or destiny.... And when you can't keep them,\nyour heart breaks. You know nothing of me--Shane....\"\n\n\"I don't want to know; I just want you, Claire-Anne!\"\n\n\"You must know something. I was just a girl, well brought up, well\neducated.... I dreamed of being a great actress. I was an actress, but I\nwas ... _manquee_ ... didn't succeed, get success.... And then I\nmarried, and my husband died.... And here I am.... And there are other\nthings you mustn't know.... Not that they are dear to me; oh, no!... but\nyou must never hear them.... O Shane, if seven years ago.... But Destiny\nor life wouldn't let us. And now we can only cheat him, and that only\nfor a while.... Because Destiny is all-seeing and jealous and cruel....\nOnly for a while, a sweet while....\"\n\n\"But, Claire-Anne, I don't understand--\"\n\n\"Don't understand, don't, my lover. Don't anything.... Only let me give\nall I have, can give to you, and let me take what you care to give in\nreturn, only that.... O Shane, we are two people in a dark wood, and it\nis lonely and terrifying.... And we have met, and our hands ... _se sont\nserrees_ ... gripped and held.... And we aren't lonely any more, or\nafraid. And you have a picture in your mind of me, a beautiful, warm\npicture.... But if the night passed, and we came to the meadow-lands....\nO Shane, don't let's go into the light--not into the open, not into the\nlight.... Oh, no! no!\"\n\n\"But, Claire-Anne....\"\n\n\"Come closer, Shane. The night is empty. There are only we two in the\nworld.... Come close. Closer. Closer still....\"\n\n\nSection 7\n\nHe was sitting in her garden one sunset, under the mulberry-tree, and\nshe had gone into the house for a minute, moving with the firm, gracious\nwalk of hers that was like the firm swimming of swans. In the little\nhush of sunset, and she gone, there came a sudden knowledge to him....\nFor a space of time, how long he knew not, he was in an Antrim study....\nWithout, the sun had gone down, and there was the purple, twilight\nwater, and the gentle calling of the cricket.... And within was a gray\nhead that had fallen on a book ... fallen ... fallen as the sun went\ndown.\n\n\"Why, Uncle Robin!\" he called.\n\nThen came a great gush of tears to his heart and eyes....\n\nShe came from the house, as again he became cognizant of the Midi garden\ninstead of the Antrim glen, of the Mediterranean instead of the waters\nof Moyle. She came down the dusky pathway. At a little distance she saw\nhis face. She stopped short, her face white....\n\n\"Shane! Shane! what is wrong? Are you hurt? Ill?\"\n\n\"My Uncle Robin is dead, Claire-Anne.\"\n\nShe looked at him for a little instant, not quite understanding. She\ncame to him swiftly as a swallow. She sat close beside him. Her arm went\nthrough his. Her hands clasped his hands.\n\n\"Why didn't you tell me, heart?\" she whispered.\n\n\"I just knew this instant. I felt, saw.... We were that close ... my\nUncle Robin! _Beannacht De ar a anam!_ God's blessing on his soul!\"\n\nShe never spoke. She never stirred. She hardly breathed. She was just\nthere, her hands, firm and strong, on his, did he want her.\n\n\"Was it ... a hard death, Shane?\"\n\n\"No; I seemed to see him, asleep, among his books.\"\n\n\"His books were his friends ... you told me....\n\n\"Yes, dear. His life was with them.\"\n\n\"And he wasn't a young man, your Uncle Robin?\"\n\n\"Eight and sixty years of age.\"\n\n\"Is it so ill, heart, to go quickly, quietly, with your friends about\nyou, on an autumn afternoon?\"\n\n\"No, dear, not ill. Very rightly ... I think. But there is something....\nSomething is gone from the world, like a fine tree from a garden....\nAnd he was awful' dear to me, my Uncle Robin.... It will be a hard thing\nto go home, and he not there to come and ask: 'Are you all right,\nladdie? You're no sick?' Claire-Anne, I'll be thinking long....\"\n\nShe sat with him in silence in the garden, and after a little while got\nup and went without a word.... And he sat in the garden thinking to\nhimself, had he been lax to Uncle Robin in any way? He might have\nwritten oftener. It wasn't fair to have kept the old man worried and he\nan apprentice at sea. Yes, he could have written, could have written\noftener. And thought more. And there were books he might have brought\nthe old man--books from 'Frisco and New York and Naples. The book-stores\nwere so far from the quays, and he had put it off. And he could have so\neasily.... When one is young, one is so thoughtless.... A message from\nsomewhere ran into his consciousness like a ripple of code-flags: 'It\ndoesn't matter, dear laddie. Don't be taking on. Don't be blaming\nyourself. You were the dear lad ... and I'm happy....'\n\nAh, yes, but a great tree was gone from the garden. An actuality had\nbeen converted into thought and emotion, and thought and emotion may be\nall that endure, and an actuality be unreal ... but an actuality is so\nwarm ... so reassuring....\n\nHe rose and went toward the house, and as he walked he met her....\n\n\"Claire-Anne, do you mind if I go back to the ship?... Somehow, I'm a\nlittle lost....\"\n\n\"There is a carriage waiting for you outside.\"\n\nFor the first time it occurred to him that in this occult experience she\nhad not uttered one jarring note. She had not asked questions, nor had\nshe tried to argue with him, as other women would have, telling him he\nfancied all this. Nor had she bothered him with vain, unwelcome\nsentiment. She had just--stood by, as at sea. And how swiftly she had\ndivined his need of privacy, of his own ship!\n\n\"There are none like you in this world, Claire-Anne,\" he told her.\n\n\"I am what you make me, Shane--what you need of me.\" Her hand sought his\nin the stilly dusk. \"Come back only when you are ready dearest ...\ndearest ... I am here! Always here!\"\n\n\nSection 8\n\nThough she never said so, yet he knew she wanted to go on board the\nship that was so much of his life, and one day he had her rowed across\nto the _Ulster Lady_. He smiled as he saw how firmly she got on board,\nthough ships were unknown to her. Queer, how she never lost dignity,\ngrace. And it was so easy for a woman to look silly, undignified,\ngetting on board ship. She never disappointed him....\n\nShe mused over the sweet line of the schooner, the tapering masts, the\nsnug canvas, the twinkling brass. The wake of a passing paddle-steamer\nmade the boat pitch gently. It was like breathing.\n\n\"She is so much a pretty lady,\" Claire-Anne said. \"So much like you,\nShane, in a way. She might be a young sister--a young, loved sister. And\nwhere is your place on board when she sails?\"\n\nHe pointed her out the space behind wheel and binnacle.\n\n\"Whenever there's any need, I'm there, just there.\"\n\n\"And Shane, great waves like you see in pictures--great enormous waves,\ndoes she stand those?\"\n\n\"Yes, great waves, like you see in pictures, she stands those. Drives\nthrough them, and over them, and under them.\"\n\n\"And Solomon said\"--she was just thinking aloud--\"that he couldn't\nunderstand the way of a ship on the sea. And he was immensely wise.\nDearest ... it can't be just wood and canvas, a ship ... power and grace\nand beauty.... It's like great people....\"\n\n\"They're as different as people are, Claire-Anne.\"\n\n\"Are they, Shane? I knew they weren't ... just things.\"\n\nHe took her below in the dusk of his cabin. She filled the space like\nsome gracious green tree.\n\n\"And here is where I live on board ship.\"\n\nThe Aberdeen terrier came forward to greet her, his tail waving gently,\nhis ears up, his brown eyes grave and warm.\n\n\"_Duine uasal! Duine uasal!_\" she knelt to him.\n\n\"You remember?\" He minded he had told her casually of the dog's name.\n\n\"Of course I remember! Shane, what does _Duine uasal_ mean?\"\n\n\"_Gentilhomme_,\" he translated.\n\n\"He has the eyes,\" she said.\n\nThe framed manuscript of his father's verses caught her eyes, and she\nlooked at him in inquiry.\n\n\"What is it?\"\n\n\"A poem of my father's, in Gaidhlig, Claire-Anne. 'The Bed of Rushes.'\"\n\n\"How queer the letters are! Slim and graceful, and powerful, too. Would\nyou read it, Shane?\"\n\n\"_Leaba luachra_,\" he read, \"a bed of rushes, _bhi fum areir_, was\nbeneath me last night, _agas do chaitheas amach e le banaghadb an lae_,\nand I threw it out with the whitening of day. _Thainic mo chead gradh le\nmo thaobh_, my hundred loves came to my side; _guala ee qualainn_,\nshoulder to shoulder, _agas beal re beal_, and mouth to mouth.\"\n\n\"Now I know you better, Shane.\"\n\n\"How, dearest?\"\n\n\"I know how you come by your--your sense of beauty, Shane. It's from\nyour father. You have it just as he had. But he could say and you can't,\nShane. You have it, but it doesn't come out that way. It comes out in\nthe sailing of the ship, Shane. You must sail beautifully. Shane, I\nshould love to see you sail.\"\n\nWith a quick movement she dropped on her knees, and her beautiful dark\nhead on the pillow of his bed.\n\n\"Couldn't you take me with you once, Shane, when you sail? Away on just\none voyage?\"\n\n\"Of course I could, dearest, and will.\"\n\n\"Would you, my heart? Would you?\" She stood up again, and swift tears\ncame to her eyes.\n\n\"I couldn't come,\" she said.\n\n\"But, Claire-Anne--\"\n\n\"No,\" she said. She turned her back to him, so that he shouldn't see her\nface, and her voice vibrated. \"No, Shane dear. No. You go to sea and\nsail your ships, and take care of them in the tempest and coax them in\nlight weather. And go from port to port, watching the strange cities and\nthe peoples, and seeing into them, with ... _tes yeux d'enfant_ ... your\neyes of a child.... And have your life, free, big, clean.... And just in\na corner ... _le plus petit coin_ ... keep me ... so when you come to\nMarseilles, you will come up the garden path in the dusk, and call,\n'Claire-Anne!'\" There was something like a sob from her. \"Just say,\n'Claire-Anne'....\"\n\nShe turned around and caught his hands for a minute, looked at him,\nsmiled, laughed.... From his desk she picked up the Young Pretender's\ndagger.\n\n\"What is this for, Shane? Is this yours?\"\n\n\"Mine now, Claire-Anne; but it was--some one else's once. My Uncle Alan,\nAlan Donn, gave it to me.\"\n\n\"Yes?...\"\n\n\"It belonged once to Charles Edward Stuart, the Young Pretender. He wore\nit at his knee in '45. Do you remember, Claire-Anne? He landed in\nScotland and advanced on England, and got as far as Derby at the head of\nthe Scottish clans and Jacobite gentlemen. 'Black Friday' they called it\nin London.\"\n\n\"But he never got to London.\"\n\n\"No, he never got to London. Crash and whir of battle, and when the\nsmoke cleared, there were the gallant Highland clansmen scattered, and\nthe sturdy English nobles, and the bonny Irish gentlemen. And a king on\nthe run!\"\n\n\"And, Shane, what happened to him after that?\"\n\n\"I think--my history may not be right, but I think he spent the rest of\nhis life a pensioner of the king of France, playing petty politics,\ndrinking, and accepting love from romantic women, and loyalty from the\nbeaten clans.\"\n\n\"What a pity, Shane! What a pity!\"\n\n\"That he failed, dearest? I don't know.\"\n\n\"Not that he failed, Shane! No! The most gallant fail, nearly always\nfail, for they take the greatest odds. But that he lived too long, Shane\n... the high moment gone....\"\n\nShe looked at the dagger again that had once snuggled to Prince\nTearloch's knee, hefted it, caressed it.\n\n\"Shane dearest, why didn't he use his own knife to--set himself free?\"\n\n\"I don't know.\"\n\n\"I think I know.\"\n\nShe faced him suddenly.\n\n\"Shane, why didn't somebody do it for him?\"\n\n\"I suppose they couldn't see the end, Claire-Anne. They couldn't foresee\nthe king of France's charity, the tricked women, the wine-stained cards.\nThere's many the Scots gentlemen who would have--set him free.\"\n\n\"But they didn't, Shane dearest. It seems--Destiny must always win.\nShane, what is that poem in Gaidhlig about the world, the verses you\nonce said?\"\n\n  \"_Treasgair an saoghal, agus tigeann an garth mar smal.\n  Alaistir, Caesar, 's an mead do bhi d'a bpairt\n  Ta an Theamhair na fear agas feach an Traoi mar ta_--\n  Life goes conquering on. The winds forever blow\n  Alexander, Caesar, and the crash of their fighting men\n  Tara is grass, and see how Troy is low--\"\n\nHe stopped with a little shock, for her face was a mask of tears.\n\n\"Dearest, dearest, it's only an old, sad story. It has nothing to do\nwith us. Claire-Anne--\"\n\n\"Is any story old, Shane? Is any story ever new? Isn't it always the\nsame story?\"\n\nShe looked at the dagger for an instant more, and put it down with a\nlittle sob.\n\n\"Poor gentleman!\"\n\n\nSection 9\n\nFrom his cabin below he could hear the Belfast mate roaring at the\nhelmsman:\n\n\"What kind of steering do you call that? Look at your damned wake. Like\nan eel's wriggle. Keep her full, and less of your damned luffin'.\"\n\n\"Keep her full, sir!\" the steersman repeated.\n\n\"Look at your foretopsail! Bouse it, blast ye! Bouse it! You Skye\ncutthroats!\"\n\nIf the nor'easter held, Shane calculated, he could run through Biscay\nfull, come into the Mediterranean on a broad reach, and jam her straight\nat Marseilles. About him was the tremor as she took the head seas.\nPlunge! Tremble! Dash on! Overhead the squeaking of the sheets, the\nsqueal of blocks, the _thrap-thrap-thrap_ of the lee halyards, the\nmelancholy whining of the gulls. With luck he would be in Marseilles\nwithin the week. And if the wind swung westward after he left Gibraltar\nto port, he would nip off hours, a day even. And every hour counted\nuntil the moment he went up the dusky path and called, \"Claire-Anne!\"\n\nHe had never before driven the _Ulster Lady_ as he was driving her now.\nBefore, he had been content to get what he could out of her, coaxing\nher, nursing her, as a trainer does a horse he is fond of; but now he\nwas riding her like a jockey intent on winning a race. On deck the crew\nwondered what had got into the old man, as they called him, for all his\ntwenty-eight years.\n\n\"Before, he was a sailor,\" the isles crew complained. \"Is he now a\nmerchant at last? _A Righ is truagh!_ O King, the pity!\"\n\nBut it was not interest in cargoes that compelled him; it was the\nthought of a face like the wing of a bird, ready to soar. The dark,\ngracious face, with the eyes where emotion swirled like a mill-race, the\nparted ruddy lips-_La Mielleuse_--mouth of honey. And the word he must\nnot say aloud, like some occult word of magic until a certain moment\nshould come:\n\n\"Claire-Anne!\" Just \"Claire-Anne!\"\n\nBefore he had left Marseilles he had not been able to think of her, to\nweigh what happened, to understand. Things were too close. But at sea,\nand in the dusk of the Antrim glen, and in Belfast and Liverpool, he had\nhad time to view the incident in perspective; to stand aside, as one\nstands back from a picture, and appreciate the color, the line, the\ntruth; to see that that rich purple, that splash of orange, that\nrippling, rich silver-gray are not spots like flowers, but a definite\ndesign....\n\nIn Antrim he had remembered Dancing Town, the vision of Fiddlers' Green.\nFourteen years before!\n\nAnd now that he remembered, it seemed to him foolish not to have known\nhe was sailing somewhere. He was always sailing.... And unexpectedly,\nafter he had given up all hope, under his lee bow had risen suddenly\nFiddlers' Green.... Once before he thought he had made port there, but\nthat only made this island the true one.... For there were always two\nthings, and the second was right.... False dawn and dawn; the False Cape\nand Cape Horn; the Southern Crosses, the false and true....\n\nAnd he would tell her this, when he met her again, of how he had been\nthinking, and discovered her to be the true life....\n\nThe wife he had married and buried seven years before he thought of now;\nshe was the second woman he had known, his mother the first. And from\nthe cold precipice of his mother he had fled into the flinty fields of\nMoyra Dolan.... He felt a little sorry for the boy he was seven years\nbefore--so young, so gallant, so wrong.... He had thought that all there\nwas in life was a home to return to, a wife, children.... He had wanted\nan acre of land in the sun, where all the world was his. When one was\nyoung, one knew so little.... Wisdom came with the lapping of the waves,\nand years of quiet thinking under the gigantic stars.... A plot of land\nhe had wanted then, and now he had the stars, they belonging more to him\nthan to the astrologers who conned them, the fields, more than to the\ntillers who cultivated them, the sea than to the fishermen who\ntrawled.... He was one with everything, understanding everything, its\nimmense harmony.... From hard earth and wet sea he had arisen on swift,\ndark pinions until he had been one with the spirit that infused all\nearth and sea and sky holding the multitudinous atoms in One with\nimmense will and scheme.... And it was she who had given them to\nhim--Claire-Anne ... the wings of the morning.... The flutter of her\nwhite hands ... the eyes that looked and drooped, looked, drooped ...\nthe little catch in her breath....\n\nHis life opened before him now, like a fair seaway. About his appointed\ntasks he would go in his appointed life ... sailing ships with needed\ncargoes ... a despatch messenger for the peoples of the world over the\nvast solitudes of sea ... doing his work well and willingly ... and\nasking no reward but that the bird of dusk, the mouth of honey, be his\nto love and be loved by ... to melt with and be one in occult alchemy of\nsoul and mind and body ... to get strength and knowledge, and the\nunderstanding which is more than strength and knowledge....\n\nHe was twenty-eight, she was twenty-five. There were twenty years before\nthem still, twenty years of love and understanding, and then a strange\nhappy twilight, like the dusk of Antrim, that gives way hardly to the\nshort night.... Some day she would marry him and come to his house ...\nsome day when something that was wrong in her heart was righted and\nforgotten, something he had no wish to intrude upon, so closely did she\nconceal it.... There was a locked, haunted room in her heart ... poor\nheart!... but one day the presence would be exercised, and the room\nswept and garnished.... Some day she would marry him, and he would bring\nher home to Ulster.... And who better than she could understand the\nspringy heather and the blue smoke-reek, the crickets of the evening\nand the curlew's call? And in the house where his mother was cold and\narrogant, would be a warm and gracious lady ... Claire-Anne!...\n\nGod! he was thinking long to be in Marseilles again, to go up the dusky\npath, to call, \"Claire-Anne!\"\n\nThe big Belfast mate larruped down the short companionway.\n\n\"How's she doing, Mr. McKinstry?\"\n\n\"She's doing fine, sir. If I may say so, there's not a better boat sails\nthe water, not the _Sovereign of the Seas_ itself. Nor a better crew to\nhandle things, not on board the king's yacht.\"\n\n\"Nor a better mate, Mr. McKinstry.\"\n\n\"Ah, well, sir; we do wir best.\"\n\nHe tumbled on deck again, and Shane could hear him roar from amidships:\n\n\"Lay forward, a couple of you damned farmers, and see if you can't get\nmore out of those jibs. Faster! faster! You're as slow as the grace of\nGod at a miser's funeral.... If I only had a crew....\"\n\n\nSection 10\n\nShe stopped in her swift flight to him through the dusk of the Midi\ngarden.\n\n\"Dearest, why is your face so white? Your hands bruised?\"\n\n\"The consul said something to me--about you--and I knocked him down.\"\n\n\"Oh!\" she said, a shocked little cry, and: \"Oh!\" a drawn-out wail of\npain. \"Why did you strike him?\"\n\n\"Because he lied about you.\"\n\nHer face was turned from him, in the dusk of the crickets, toward the\nwooded amphitheater, where dead Pontius roved wild-eyed in the dusk,\nwhere Lazarus tossed uneasily in his second sleep, where the Greeks lay\nin alien soil, and the shadows of Roman legionaries looked puzzled at\nthe flat sea, not recognizing busy Tiber--her back was to him, her head\nup in pain, her nerve-wrenched hands uneasy, white....\n\n\"He didn't lie,\" she said at last. \"Oh, you'd have known it sooner or\nlater. No! no! He didn't lie.\"\n\n\"Claire-Anne!\"\n\n\"He didn't lie. I was just a fool to think--oh, well, he didn't lie. No,\nno!\" she repeated. \"He didn't lie.\" She threw out a hand hopelessly. \"He\ndidn't lie.\"\n\nHe went up to her in the dusk, put his hands gently on her shoulders.\nThe quivering frame became still suddenly, with a greater nervousness.\nShe was like a deer ready to bound away....\n\n\"I don't see what I could have done, Claire-Anne. But--can I do anything\nnow?\"\n\nShe turned toward him suddenly. Her face was a mask of pain--and\nsurprise.\n\n\"Then you haven't grown cold to me, unmerciful, ... or gross?\"\n\n\"Why, no, Claire-Anne!\"\n\n\"And you know.\"\n\n\"I--know, but I don't understand....\"\n\nShe gave a queer, little shuddering cry, half laugh, half sob. She moved\nover to the seat by the whispering mulberry-tree, and dropped in it, her\nhands covering her face.\n\n\"All the wrong,\" she said, \"that people call wrong I've done I didn't\nmind. But the one decent thing--of loving you--that's kept me awake all\nthe time you were away. It's been like a sin, letting you love me. The\nrest was destiny, but this one thing was--I.\"\n\nShe suddenly raised her face, her eyes shining through the humid mask of\nit.\n\n\"Would you--could you--understand?\"\n\n\"Tell me, Claire-Anne, what you want to.\"\n\nShe drew a short gasping breath, turned her head away, looked up,\nturned it away again, paused for breath, gripped his hand by the\nwrist....\n\n\"I ... I ... I was the child of actors, and they died, and there was\nenough money to bring me up and educate me, and give me my chance on the\nstage.... And I wasn't good enough.... I was too much myself. Couldn't\nquite be other characters. I don't know if you understand.... But ...\nthen a man got infatuated with me and married me.... And later he wished\nhe'd married a--comfortable woman with a fortune.... And then he died\nand left me ... not very much.... But that was not the reason.... I was\nleft, how do you say?... stranded. I had no career, no husband, no\nchild, no business. France, it is not easy ... not easy anywhere....\nFriends? People are too busy.... And I was ... just there.... And all\naround me life bubbled and flowed, and I was ... not dead, not alive ...\nand alone ... I might have been a leper, but even lepers have colonies,\nand some one to be kind to them ... not dead, not alive ... and alone. I\nwas so young.... It was unfair. Life was everywhere like a sparkling\nwine ... but where I was, was flat....\n\n\"And then--then I met a man ... it was pleasant for a while--to have\nsome one to talk to, to go around with. It's so pleasant to laugh. You\ndon't know how pleasant until you haven't laughed for a long time.... He\ndidn't want to marry ... and in the end it was a choice of--oh, well ...\nor going back to being not dead, not alive ... and I couldn't go, just\ncouldn't. And he gave me presents of money.... And then he got married.\nI don't blame him ... a comfortable woman with a fortune ... but I\nwasn't left for long.... Where one goes, others always follow....\nThere's a sort of ... _sentier intuitif_, a psychic path....\n\n\"And I wasn't so ashamed ... I was a little glad I had a place in the\nworld ... a work even.... And every one might despise me.... I had a\nplace.... I was no longer not dead, not alive.... I was even thankful\nfor that.... Until I met you with your--terrible courtesy, with your\nunderstanding.... My head and my heart melted, and my body, too, and all\nhad been so firm, so decided.... And I dreamed that I could snatch a\nwhile from destiny.... But--you see.... What the consul said was true,\nso ... dearest--but I mustn't ever call you dearest again.\"\n\n\"Claire-Anne!\"\n\n\"Well, then--dearest, you see why I couldn't marry you when you asked.\"\nShe laughed bitterly. \"If you had only known....\"\n\nHe took a terrible grip on himself, faced her, looked at her.\n\n\"Claire-Anne, will you marry me now?\"\n\n\"I don't know why you say it, but I know one thing: you are true. And I\nthank you ... but please don't make me cry any more. I have cried so\nmuch when you were away.... If only five years ago before I was ...\n_estropiee_ ... crippled....\n\n\"Destiny....\"\n\n\nSection 11\n\nDusk had gone; darkness had come, and now darkness itself would leave\nsoon, for the third quarter of a great saffron moon showed its edge in\nthe eastward. Marseilles was like the pale light of a candle. And a\ngreat palpable darkness had settled like water in the hollow of the\nwoods.\n\n\"Dearest\"--her voice took sudden strength--\"will you forgive me? I don't\nsay that just as if I'd done a small wrong. But will a big power come\nout of your heart and say: 'It's all right, Claire-Anne. I understood.'\nIt will be so much for me to know that--in the days when you are gone--\"\n\n\"But, Claire-Anne, I'm not gone--\"\n\n\"You must go, dearest. You must go now. Don't you see?\" Her voice grew\ngentle. \"You couldn't stay any more. It wouldn't be like you, somehow.\nAnd I wouldn't have you spoiled in my eyes ... darling, you could never\nbe ... but you must go....\"\n\n\"And you, Claire-Anne--\"\n\n\"Destiny ... a long, lean finger ... a path....\"\n\n\"But you never know--\"\n\n\"We know, we poor women, Shane. We know.... Shane, don't you understand\n... what makes the ... girl in the archway, the emperor's mistress,\ndrink, take ether ... do strange horrors?.... They know.... And they\nwant to escape from seeing it ... for an instant even ... the terrible\nstory of the _Belle Heaulmiere_ ... the 'Armorer's Daughter':\n\n  _\"Ainsi le bon temps regretons\n    Entre nous, pauvres vielles sotes,\n  Assises bas, a crouppetons,\n    Tout en ung tas commes pelotes_,\n    _A petit feu de chenevotes\n  Tost allumees, tost estaintes:\n    Et jadis fusmes si mignotes!...\n  Ainsi emprent a maintes et maintes._\n\n\"Do you understand, Shane, do you understand? So we regret the good old\ntimes, poor old light women, gathered together like fagots, and\nhunkering over a straw fire, soon lit, soon out--_tost allumees, tost\nestaintes_ ... and once we were so dainty. To many and many's the one it\nhappens. _Pauvres vielles sotes!_ Poor old light women, Shane.... _Et\njadis fusmes si mignotes!_ ... Dainty as I am, they were once.... And do\nyou blame them now when see it coming ... the drink, the ether ... the\nabominable things....\"\n\n\"O my God! Claire-Anne!\"\n\n\"Heart of hearts, Shane. I once escaped to light, where they escape to\noblivion.... Once I had you, and all my life I'll remember it.... All my\nlife I'll remember: I once knew a man.... And it will be a help, so much\na help....\"\n\n\"Oh, Claire-Anne, it can't be!\"\n\n\"It must be, dearest heart. It is--decreed. Darling, sometimes I\nthought--Do you remember your showing me the poor prince's dagger, and\nour talking about him--setting himself free--and I said I thought I\ncould understand why he did not.... I've wanted to, myself.... But....\nThere's a way you're brought up, when you're young.... They put such\nfear of God in you ... such fear of hell ... you never could--throw\nthings down and go straight to Him, and say: 'I couldn't. I just simply\ncouldn't. I hadn't the strength. I couldn't ... just....' And they never\nthink of Him saying: 'Of course you couldn't.... And it was all My\nfault. I wasn't looking.... I've so much to think of.... You did right\nto come to Me....' But, no! no! One fears. They teach you so much fear,\nShane, when you are young ... so that even this is better--this--game,\nwhere none win.... And so--one goes on....\"\n\nShe rose suddenly and clutched his shoulders in panic. Her mouth twisted\nin piteous agony....\n\n\"Oh, but dearest, dearest, _pauvres vielles sotes_, poor old light\nwomen.... Shane, _assises bas, a crouppetons_, in an archway, hoping for\na drunken farmer with a couple of sous ... and so cold, so cold, with a\nlittle fire of straw stalks ... _tost allumees, tost estaintes!_\" ...\n\n\"No, Claire-Anne! no!\"\n\n\"A drunken farmer, or traveling pedler.... _Et jadis fusmes si\nmignotes_ ... and so dainty once!\"\n\n\"No!\" His voice took the ring of decision. She didn't hear him. Her\nvoice broke into a torrent of sobs.\n\n\"Take me in your arms, Shane, once more. And let my heart come into your\nheart, where it's so warm ... and I'll have something to remember in the\ndays when it will be ... so cold, so cold ... and I'll be there warming\nold bones.... _A petit feu de chenevotes_.... Shane, dearest,\nplease....\"\n\nHe took her in his arms, and her body seemed to be some light envelope\nin which a great turmoil of spirit beat, as a wild bird beats against a\ncage.... He could hardly hold her body so much was her tortured\nsobbing.... So much did what was within wheel and beat, beat and wheel,\nin unendurable panic. Her voice murmured in his wet shoulder:\n\n\"_Pauvre vielle sote!_ O Shane, Shane ... _pauvre vielle sote!\"_ ...\n\n\nSection 12\n\nAbove him, to starboard, he could hear the churning of the tug that was\nto take them from the docks to the open sea. Overhead the pilot was\nstamping impatiently. Forward the mate was roaring like a bull:\n\n\"Where is that damned apprentice? Tell him to lay aft and bear a hand\nwith the warps.\"\n\nIn a minute or so he would have to go on the poop and give orders to let\ngo and haul in. The tug was blowing, \"Hurry up....\" He ought to be on\ndeck now.... He hated to go up ... he hated to see the last of\nMarseilles ... he would never see Marseilles again....\n\nWas all ready? Yes, all was ready. Cargo, supplies, sea-chest,\neverything for the long voyage he had decided--had to decide--on at the\nlast minute. Forward across the Atlantic to where the sou'east trades\nblew, and then south'ard reaching under all sail--the fleecy clouds, the\nbright constellations of the alien pole, the strange fish-like birds,\nthe flying-fish, the bonita, the albacore; the chill gust from the River\nPlate; the roar of the gales of the forties; the tremendous fight around\nthe Horn, with a glimpse of land now and then as they fought for\neasting--the bleak rocks of Diego Ramirez and the Iledefonsos, and\nperhaps the blue ridge of Cape Horn, or of the False Cape; then,\nnorthward to Callao ... anywhere, everywhere ... new seas, new lands,\nnew cities ... but never again Marseilles....\n\nAnd he would never see her again, _La Mielleuse_--couldn't if he wanted\nto ... never again ... irrevocable.... On that pillow she had laid her\nhead, her dark darling head!... And last night he had seen it for the\nlast time, dark, smiling in sleep, on a snowy pillow.... He remembered\nas he might remember a strange pantomime.... His going to his coat\nfor--what he had there ... the silent tiptoe ... the gentle raising of\nher left arm, as she smiled in her sleep ... the sudden weakness at her\nsoft warm beauty ... the decision.... Of course he had done right!... Of\ncourse!... Of course!...\n\nOverhead the pilot stamped on the deck in a flurry of impatience. The\ntug wailed in irritation. He must get on deck....\n\nHe threw one last glance around.... He had everything he needed for\nhimself.... Nothing lacking.... His eyes paused for a moment on his\ndesk. Wait! Where was the dagger? Prince Charles's dagger?\n\nHe gripped himself in fright. Was he going--had he gone--mad? He knew\nwhere that was ... he knew ... he knew.... It was--\n\n\"Ogh!\" A flash of horror went over him.... But he had done right ... of\ncourse he had done right....\n\n\"All's ready, sir,\" the mate called in to his cabin.\n\n\"Yes?...\"\n\n\"Man, you're no' ill?\" the mate looked at him, queerly.\n\n\"Of course I'm not ill.\" He swung on deck. \"All right? Let go aft, then,\nand haul in. Tug a little westward: a little more westward. Hard a port,\nMr. McKinstry. All right! Let go all, for'a'd.... She's off....\"\n\n\n\n\nPART FOUR\n\nTHE WRESTLER FROM ALEPPO\n\n\nSection 1\n\n\"_Ya Zan_,\" came his wife's slow grave voice, \"O Shane, when your ship\nis in trouble, or does not go fast, do the passengers beat you?\"\n\n\"Of course not,\" Campbell laughed. \"What put that in your little head?\"\n\n\"When I went with my uncle, Arif Bey, on the pilgrimage to Mecca--Arif\nwas a Moslem that year\"--she bit the thread of the embroidery she was\ndoing with her little sharp teeth, _tkk!_--\"our ship anchored for the\nnight in _Birkat Faraun_--Pharaoh's Bay. In the morning it would not\nmove, so the Maghrabi pilgrims beat the captain terribly. And once at\nAl-Akabah, when the captain lost sight of shores for one whole long day,\nthe Maghrabis beat him again. They said he should have known better.\nDon't--don't they ever beat you, _ya Zan_?\"\n\n\"Not yet, Fenzile. They only beat bad skippers.\"\n\n\"But our _Rais_ was a good sailor. He must have been a good sailor, Zan.\nHe was very old. He was very pious, too. He said the prayers. Do you\never say the prayers, Zan, when the sea looks as if it were about to be\nangry?\"\n\n\"What sort of prayers, Fenzile?\"\n\n\"Oh, prayers. Let me see.\" Her dark eyes had the look he loved, as if\nshe had turned around and were rummaging within herself, as a woman\nseeks diligently and yet slowly in a chest. \"Oh, like the Moslem's _Hizb\nal-Bahr_. You ought to know that prayer, _ya Zan_. It will make you safe\nat sea. I wonder you, a great _Rais_, do not know that prayer.\"\n\n\"What is the prayer, Fenzile?\"\n\n\"'We pray Thee for safety in our goings forth and our standings\nstill.... Subject unto us this sea, even as Thou didst subject the deep\nto Moses, and as Thou didst subject the fire to Abraham, and as Thou\ndidst subject the iron to David, and as Thou didst subject the wind and\nthe devils and djinns and mankind to Solomon, and as Thou didst subject\nthe moon and _Al-Burah_ to Mohammed, on whom be Allah's mercy and His\nblessing! And subject unto us all the seas in earth and heaven, in Thy\nvisible and in Thine invisible worlds, the sea of this life and the sea\nof futurity. O Thou Who reignest over everything and unto Whom all\nthings return.' ... You must know that prayer, and say that prayer, _ya\nZan_. What do you do when it is very stormy?\"\n\n\"Oh, take in as little sail as possible and keep shoving ahead.\"\n\n\"I don't understand,\" she let the embroidery fall in her lap. \"I see\nyour ship from the quays and I can't understand how you guide such a big\nship. And how you go at night, Zan, that I cannot understand. It is so\ndark at night. There is a terrible lot I do not understand. I am very\nstupid.\"\n\n\"You are very dear and darling, Fenzile. You understand how to take care\nof a house and how to be very beautiful, and be very loving--\"\n\n\"Do I, Zanim? That is not hard. That is not very much. That is not like\nsailing a ship on the sea.\"\n\nWithout, Beirut seethed with life. Thin, gaunt dogs barked and snarled\nin the narrow staired streets. Came the cry of the donkey-boys. Came the\ncry of the water-sellers. Came the shouts of the young Syrians over the\ngammon game. Loped the laden camels. Tramped the French soldiers. Came a\nnew hum....\n\nFenzile rose and went through the courtyard, past the little fountain\nwith the orange-trees, past the staircase to the upper gallery, came to\nthe barred iron gates, looked a moment, moved modestly back into the\nshadows....\n\n\"O look, _ya Zan_,\" her grave voice became excited. \"Come quickly. See.\nIt is Ahmet Ali, with his attendants and a lot of people following him.\"\n\n\"And who is Ahmet Ali?\"\n\n\"Ahmet Ali! don't you know, Zanim? The great wrestler, Ahmet Ali. The\nwrestler from Aleppo....\"\n\n\nSection 2\n\nThrough the grilled door, in the opal shade of the walls, Shane saw the\nwrestler stroll down the street; a big bulk of a man in white robe and\nturban, olive-skinned, heavy on his feet, seeming more like a prosperous\nyoung merchant than a wrestling champion of a vilayet. Yet underneath\nthe white robes Shane could sense the immense arms and shoulders, the\npowerful legs. Very heavily he moved, muscle-bound a good deal, Shane\nthought; a man for pushing and crushing and resisting, but not for fast,\nnervous work, sinew and brain coordinating like the crack of a whip. A\nCornish wrestler would turn him inside out within a minute; a Japanese\nwould pitch him like a ball before he had even taken his stance. But\nonce he had a grip he would be irresistible.\n\n\"So that's Ahmet Ali.\"\n\n\"Yes, Zan,\" Fenzile clapped her hands with delight, like a child seeing\na circus procession. \"Oh, he is a great wrestler. He beat Yussuf\nHussein, the Cairene, and he beat a great Russian wrestler who came on a\npilgrimage to Jerusalem. And he beat a French sailor. And he beat a\nTartar. Oh, he is a great wrestler, Ahmet Ali.\"\n\nThe wrestler had come nearer. Behind him came four or five supporters,\nin cloth white as his. Behind them came a ruck of Syrian youths,\neffeminate, vicious. Came a croud of donkey-boys, impish, black. The\nwrestler walked more slowly as he approached to pass the iron doors. And\nShane was startled into a sudden smile at the sight of his face--a\ngirl's face, with a girl's eyes. And in his hand was a rose. A wrestler\nwith a rose!\n\n\"Why, a man could kill him.\"\n\n\"Oh, no! Oh, no, Zan!\" Fenzile said. \"He is very strong. He conquered\nYussuf Hussein, the Cairene, and Yussuf Hussein could bend horseshoes\nwith his bare hands. He is very strong, very powerful Ahmet Ali.\"\n\nThe wrestler was walking slowly past the house throwing glances through\nthe grill with his full girl's eyes. A quick suspicion came into\nCampbell's mind. He turned to his wife.\n\n\"Does he come past here often?\"\n\n\"Yes, yes, Zan. Every day.\"\n\n\"Does he stop and look into the court like that, every time?\"\n\n\"Yes, Zan. Every time,\" she smiled.\n\n\"Do you know whom he's looking for?\"\n\n\"Yes, Zan. For me.\"\n\nCampbell's hand shot out suddenly and caught her wrist.\n\n\"Fenzile,\" his voice was cold. \"You aren't carrying on with, encouraging\nthis--Ahmet Ali?\"\n\n\"Zan Cam'el,\" her child's eyes flashed unexpectedly. \"I am no cheap\nCairene woman. I am a Druse girl. The daughter of a Druse Bey.\"\n\n\"I am sorry, Fenzile.\"\n\nShe looked at him steadily with her great green eyes, green of the sea,\nand as he looked at her sweet roundish face, her little mouth half open\nin sincerity, her calm brow, her brown arch of eyebrow, she seemed to\nhim no more than a beautiful proud child. There was no guile in her.\n\n\"You mustn't be foolish, you know, Fenzile.\"\n\n\"_Severim Seni._ I love only you, Zan. But it is so funny to see him go\nby, I must always smile. Don't you think it funny, Zan?\"\n\n\"No, I don't think it at all funny.\"\n\n\"Oh, but it is funny, Zan. A big strong wrestler like that to be foolish\nover a very little woman. And for a cheap showman of the market-place to\nbe lifting his eyes to a daughter of the Druse emirs. It is funny.\"\n\n\"It isn't funny. And he isn't much of a wrestler anyway.\"\n\n\"Oh, but he is, Zan. He is a very great wrestler. They say he threw and\nkilled a bear.\"\n\n\"O kooltooluk. Hell! I could throw him myself.\"\n\nShe said nothing, turning her head, and reaching for her embroidery.\n\n\"Don't you believe me, Fenzile? I tell you I could make mince-meat of\nhim.\"\n\n\"Of course, Zan. Of course you could.\" And she smiled. But this time it\nwasn't the delighted smile of a child. It was the grave patient smile of\na wise woman. And Shane knew it. Past that barrier he could not break.\nAnd on her belief he could make no impress. There was no use arguing,\ntalking. She would just smile and agree. And her ideal of strength and\npower would be the muscle-bound hulk of the Aleppo man, with the girl's\nface and the girl's eyes, and the rose in his hand. And Shane, all his\nlife inured to sport, hard as iron, supple as a whip, with his science\npicked up from Swedish quartermasters and Japanese gendarmes, from mates\nand crimps in all parts of the world, would always be in her eyes an\ninfant compared to the monstrous Syrian! Not that it mattered a tinker's\ncurse, but--\n\nOh, damn the wrestler from Aleppo!\n\n\nSection 3\n\nHe had thought, when he left Liverpool on a gusty February day, of all\nthe peace and quiet, of the color and life there would be on the Asian\nshore ... Europe had somehow particularly sickened him on this last\nvoyage.... All its repose was sordid, all its passion was calculated.\nEngland and its queen mourned the sudden death of the prince consort,\nbut it mourned him with a sort of middle-class domesticity, and no\nmajesty. So a grocer's family might have mourned, remembering how well\npapa cut the mutton.... He was so damned good at everything, Albert was,\nand he approved of art and science--within reason.... There was a\ncontest for a human ideal in America, and in the ports of England\nprivateers were being fitted out, to help the South, as the Greeks\nmight, for a price.... And Napoleon, that solemn comedian, was making\nready his expedition to Mexico, with fine words and a tradesman's\ncunning.... And the drums of Ulster roared for Garibaldi, rejoicing in\nthe downfall of the harlot on seven hills, as Ulster pleasantly\nconsidered the papal states, while Victor Emmanuel, sly Latin that he\nwas, thought little of liberty and much about Rome.... Aye, kings!\n\nAnd so a great nostalgia had come over Shane Campbell on this voyage for\nthe Syrian port and the wife he had married there. He wanted sunshine.\nHe wanted color. He wanted simplicity of life. Killing there was in\nSyria, great killing too. But it was the sort of killing one understood\nand could forgive. A Druse disliked a Maronite Christian, so he went\nquietly and knifed him. Another Maronite resented that, and killed a\nDruse; and they were all at it, hell-for-leather. But it was passion and\nfanaticism, not high-flown words and docile armies and the tradesmen\nsneaking up behind.... Ave, war!\n\nAnd he was sick of the damned Mersey fog, and he was sick of the\ndrunkenness of Scotland Road, and he was sick of the sleet lashing\nHoylake links. He was sick of Pharisaical importers who did the heathen\nin the eye on Saturday and on Sunday in their blasted conventicles\nthumped their black-covered craws in respectable humility.... In Little\nAsia religion was a passion, not a smug hypocrisy; and though the\nheathen was dishonest, yet it was not the mathematical reasoned\ndishonesty of the Christian. It was a childish game, like\nhorse-coping.... And in the East they did not blow gin in your face,\nsmelling like turpentine....\n\nAnd he was sick of the abominable homes, the horsehair furniture with\nthe anti-macassars--Lord! and they called themselves clean.... He wanted\nthe spotlessness of the Syrian courtyard.... The daubs on the British\nwalls, sentimental St. Bernard dogs and dray-horses with calves' eyes,\nbrought him to a laughing point when he thought of the subtlety of color\nand line in strange Persian rugs....\n\nAnd he was sick of British women, with their knuckled hands, their\nsplayed feet. Their abominable dressing, too, a bust and a brooch and a\nhooped skirt--their grocers' conventions, prudish, almost obscene,\navoiding of the natural in word, deed, or thought.... He wanted Fenzile,\nwith her eyes, _vert de mer_, her full childish face, her slim hands\nwith the orange-tinted finger nails, her silken trousers, her little\nslippers of silver and blue.... Her soft arms, her back-thrown head, her\nclosed lids.... And the fountain twinkling in the soft Syrian night,\nwhile afar off some Arab singer chanted a poem of Lyla Khanim's:\n\n\"_Beni ser-mest u hayran eyleyen ol yar; janim dir_.... The world is a\nprison and my heart is scarred.... My tears are like a vineyard's\nfountain, O absent one....\"\n\nAnd here was Beirut again: here the snowy crest of Lebanon, here the\nroadstead crowded with craft; here the mulberry groves. Here the\nsparkling sapphire sea; here the turf blazing with poppies; here the\nquiet pine road to Damascus; here the forests, excellent with cedars.\nHere the twisting unexpected streets. Here his own quiet house, with the\ncourtyard and its fountain. Here the hum of the bazaars, here the\n_ha-ha_ of the donkey boys, here the growling camels. Here the rugs on\nthe wall; here the little orange-trees. Here the two negress servants,\nclean, efficient. Here color, and peace, and passion. Here Fenzile....\n\nAnd this damned wrestler from Aleppo must go and spoil it all.\n\n\nSection 4\n\nHe might have shipped with one of the great American clippers racing\naround Cape Hope under rolling topsails, and become in his way as well\nknown as Donald Mackay was, who built and mastered the _Sovereign of the\nSeas_, with her crew of one hundred and five, four mates and two\nboatswains. He might have had a ship like Phil Dumaresq's _Surprise_,\nthat had a big eagle for her figurehead. He might have clipped the\nrecord of the _Flying Cloud_, three hundred and seventy-four miles in\none day, steering northward and westward around Cape Horn. He might have\nhad a ship as big as the _Great Republic_, the biggest ship that ever\ntook the seas. He might have had one of the East Indiamen, and the state\nof an admiral. He might have had one of the new adventurers in steel and\nsteam.\n\nBut fame and glory never allured him, and destiny did not call him to be\nany man's servant. He was content to be his own master with his own\nship, and do whatsoever seemed to him good and just to do. If they\nneeded him and his boat anywhere, he would be there. When they needed\nboats to America, he was there. But if they didn't need him, he was not\nthe one to thrust himself. Let destiny call.\n\nSuccess, as it was called, was a thing of destiny. When destiny needed a\nman, destiny tapped him on the shoulder. Failure, however, was a man's\nown fault. There was always work to do. And it was up to every man to\nfind his work. If there was no room for him in a higher work it was no\nexcuse for his not working in a lower plane. There would be no failures,\nhe thought, if folk were only wise. If a man came a cropper in a big\nway, it was because he had rushed into a work before Destiny, the\ninvisible infallible nuncio of God, had chosen her man. Or because he\nwas dissatisfied, ambition and ability not being equal. Or because he\nwas lazy.\n\nAlways there was work to do, as there was work for him now. Clouds of\nsail and tubby steamboats went the crowded tracks of the world's waters,\nnot to succor and help but for gain of money. And Lesser Asia was\nneglected, now that the channel of commerce to the States was opened\nwide. Syria needed more than sentimental travelers to the Holy Land. It\nneeded machinery for its corn-fields and its mines. It needed prints and\nmuslins from the Lancashire looms. It needed rice and sugar. And it had\nmore to give than a religious education. Fine soap and fruit and wine\nand oil and sesame it gave, golden tobacco, and beautiful craftmanship\nin silver and gold, fine rugs from Persia. Brass and copper and\nornamental woodcarving from Damascus, mother of cities; walnuts, wheat,\nbarley, and apricots from its gardens and fields. Wool and cotton, gums\nand saffron from Aleppo, and fine silk embroidery.\n\nOthers might race past Java Head to China for tea and opium. Others\nmight make easting around the Horn to the gold-fields of California.\nOthers might sail up the Hooghly to Calicut, trafficking with mysterious\nIndian men. Others might cross to the hustle and welter of New York,\nyoung giant of cities, but Campbell was content to sail to Asia Minor.\nHe brought them what they needed and they sent color and rime to prosaic\nBritain, hashish to the apothecaries, and pistachios from Aleppo,\ncambric from Nablus and linen from Bagdad, and occasionally for an\nantiquary a Damascene sword that rang like a silver bell.\n\nFor others the glory and fame to which destiny had called them. For\nothers the money that they grubbed with blunted fingers from the\ndross-heaps of commerce. But for Campbell what work he could do, well\ndone--and Lesser Asia ...\n\n\nSection 5\n\nOf all the seas he had sailed it seemed to Shane that Mediterranean had\nmore color, more life, more romance than any. Not the battles round the\nHorn, not the swinging runs to China, not the starry southern seas had\nfor him the sense of adventure that Mediterranean had. Mediterranean was\nnot a sea. It was a home haven, with traditions of the human house. Here\nSennacherib sailed in the great galleys the brown Sidonian shipwrights\nhad made for him. Here had been the Phenicians with their brailed\nsquaresail. Here had been the men of Rhodes, sailors and fighters both.\nHere the Greek penteconters with their sails and rigging of purple and\nblack. Here the Cypriotes had sailed under the lee of the islands Byron\nloved and where Sappho sang her songs like wine and honey, sharp wine\nand golden honey. Here had the Roman galleys splashed and here the great\nVenetian boats set proud sail against the Genoese. Here had the\nLion-heart sailed gallantly to Palestine. Here had Icarus fallen in the\nblue sea. Here had Paul been shipwrecked, sailing on a ship of\nAndramyttium bound to the coast of Asia, crossing the sea which is off\nCilicia and Pamphylia, and trans-shipping at Myra. How modern it all\nsounded but for the strange antique names.\n\n\"And when we had sailed slowly many days\"--only a seaman could feel the\npathos of that--\"and scarce were come over against Cnidus, the wind not\nsuffering us, we sailed under Crete, over against Salmone;\n\n\"And, hardly passing it, came unto a place which is called The Fair\nHavens--\"\n\nWas Paul a sailor, too, Campbell often wondered? The bearded Hebrew,\nlike a firebrand, possibly epileptic, not quite sane, had he at one time\nbeen brought up to the sea? \"Sirs,\" he had said, \"I perceive that this\nvoyage will be with hurt and much damage, not only of the lading and\nship, but also of our lives.\" There spoke a man who knew the sea--not a\ntimid passenger. But the master of the ship thought otherwise and yet\nPaul was right. And then came \"a tempestuous wind, called Euroclydon.\"\nAnd that was the Levanter of to-day, Euraquilo, they call it--hell let\nloose. Then came furious seas, and the terrors of a lee shore; the\nfrapping of the ship and the casting overboard of tackle, the\njettisoning of freight--\n\n\"And when neither sun nor stars in many days appeared, and no small\ntempest lay on us, all hope that we should be saved was then taken\naway.\" Somehow the absolute fidelity of the sea-life of the story went\nto Campbell's heart, and the figure of Paul the mariner was clearer than\nthe figure of Paul the Apostle.\n\n\"Howbeit, we must be cast upon a certain island.\n\n\"But when the fourteenth night was come, as we were driven up and down\nin Adria, about midnight the shipmen deemed that they drew near to some\ncountry--\"\n\nThe intuition of seamanship. The flash. How modern! Oh, Paul lived in\nthat sea. His ghost and memory were forever there, as were the ghosts of\nthe Lion-heart; and of Sappho, singer of songs; and of the stout\nPhenician sailing men; and of the doges of Venice, lovers and husbands\nof the sea. On the tideless Mediterranean beauty still abided, as\nnowhere else; would abide, when nowhere else--\n\nWould it, though? Would it abide anywhere? A pang came into Campbell's\nheart. Off Finisterre he had been passed by Robert Steel of Greenock's\n_Falcon_, every sail drawing, skysails and moonrakers set, a pillar of\nwhite cloud she seemed, like some majestic womanhood. And while boats\nlike the _Fiery Cross_ and the _Falcon_ tore along like greyhounds,\nthere were building tubby iron boats to go by steam. The train was\nbeating the post-chaise with its satiny horses, the train that went by\ncoal one dug from the ground. And even now de Lesseps and his men were\ndigging night and day that the steamboat might push the proud clipper\nfrom the seas. Queer! Would there come a day when no topgallants drew?\nAnd the square-rigged ships would be like old crones gathering fagots on\nan October day. And what would become of the men who built and mastered\ngreat racing ships? And would the sea itself permit vile iron and smudgy\ncoal to speck its immaculate bosom? Must the sea, too, be tamed like a\ndancing bear for the men who are buying and selling? It seemed\nimpossible.\n\nBut the shrewd men who trafficked said it must be so. They were spending\ntheir money on de Lesseps's fabulous scheme. And the shrewd men never\nspent money without a return. They would conquer.\n\nPoor sea of the Vikings! Poor sea of the Lion-heart and of the Sappho of\nthe songs! Poor sea of Admiral Columbus! Poor sea to whom Paul made\nobeisance! Sea of Drake and sea of Nelson, and sea of Philip of Spain.\nPoor sea whom the great doges of Venice wed with a ring of gold! Christ!\nIf they could only bottle you, they would sell you like Holland gin!\n\n\nSection 6\n\nHe had figured his work. He had figured his field. It seemed to him that\nthis being done life should flow on evenly as a stream. But there were\ngaps of unhappiness that all the subtle sailing of a ship, all the\ncommerce of the East, all the fighting of the gales could not fill.\nWithin him somewhere was a space, in his heart, in his head, somewhere,\na ring, a pit of emotion--how, where, why he could not express. It just\nexisted. And this was filled at times with concentration on his work, at\ntimes with plans of the future and material memories of the past or\nthoughts of ancient shipmates, of his Uncle Robin. It was like a house,\nthat space was, with a strange division of time, that corresponded not\nwith time of day, but with recurrent actions, memories, moods. There\nwould be the bustle of his work, and that seemed to be morning. There\nwould be the planning of future days, and that seemed like an\nafternoon, of sunshine; and there would be memories, as of old\nshipmates, as of Uncle Robin--God rest his dear soul; as of Alan Donn\nwith his hearty cursing, his hearty laugh. And that was like an evening\nwith golden candle-light and red fire burning. And then would come the\nquietness of night, all the bustle, all the plans, all the memories\ngone. The fire out, the rooms empty. And in the strange place somewhere\nwithin would come a strange lucidity, blue and cold and absolute as the\nstars, and into that place would walk, as players stalk upon the stage,\neach of three ghosts.\n\nThe first was his mother, who was dead, an apparition of chilling\nterror. From afar she beheld him with eyes that were queerly inimical.\nShe had done nothing to him, nor he anything to her. She had done\nnothing for him, nor he for her. Between them was nothing. When she had\ndied he had felt nothing, and that was the tragedy. No tears, no relief,\nnothing. She had carried him in her womb, born him, suckled him; and he\nhad always felt he had been unwelcome. There had been no hospitality in\nher body; just constraint. She had had no welcome for the little guest\nof God; her heart had been hard to him and he at her breasts. Nothing\ncommon to them in life, and now joined through the horrible significant\ngulf of death. She could be with him always now, being dead. But where a\nman's mother should come to him smilingly, with soft hands, with wisdom\nand comfort passing that of life, she came with terrible empty eyes. He\ncould see her gaunt profile, her black brows. She was like an engraving\nhe had once seen of the witch Saul had used at En-dor, to call up\nSamuel, who was dead. She had the same awful majesty, the same utter\nloneliness.\n\n\"You gave me nothing in life. In death give me peace,\" he would cry. But\nshe stayed until it suited her to go, as she would have done in life.\nHer haunted, haunting eyes ...!\n\nAnd there would come another ghost, the ghost of the girl he had married\nand he a boy--fourteen years ago. It was strange how he could remember\nher--her red hair, her sullen mouth, her suspicious eyes. Her shoulders\ndrooped a little; there was no grace to her stance. She complained\nagainst something, but she did not accuse him. He had married her, and\nshe had married him, and she had died. That was all there was to it. And\nthough she had sorrowed his younger days, yet he felt very kindly to\nher. There she was, with her sullen mouth, her drooping shoulders,\ncomplaining. \"Life is so short, and there was so little to it, and\nothers have so much,\" she seemed to say. \"I had a right to have my man\nand a place in the country, the like of other girls, but all I got was\nyou. And death at the end of a short year. Wasn't it hard, och, wasn't\nit so!\" And he had to comfort her. \"It was nobody's fault, Moyra. It\njust happened. We were awfully young.\" But her lips were still sullen,\nher eyes suspicious as she went away. \"A short life and a bitter one. A\nhard thing surely!\" When she left him there was a sigh of relief. Poor\ngirl!\n\nAnd the third ghost was hardly a presence, but an absence, or a presence\nso intangible that it was worse than an absence. Claire-Anne, who was\ndead, whom he had--made dead, whom he had taken it upon himself to set\nfree. For a year after he had left Marseilles she had seemed to be\nalways with him, closer in spirit, now she was dead, than she had ever\nbeen in flesh and spirit when alive. A part of him she seemed always to\nbe. Always there, in the quiet cabin, on the heeling decks, on the solid\nshore. And the long thoughts of him seemed to be conversation with her,\non strange beautiful things, on strange terrible things, on the common\ncommodity of life.... And then one day she left him....\n\nHe was coming into Southampton Water and waiting for the pilot's cutter\nfrom the Solent, one bright July morning. And all the Solent was dotted\nwith sails, the snowy sails of great yachts and the cinnamon sails of\nsmall ones. Little fishing-craft prowled near the shore. And afar off,\nin fancy, he could see the troops of swans, and the stalking herons. The\npilot's cutter plowed toward him, her deep forefoot dividing the water\nlike a knife. Immense, vibrant beauty. And he felt, as always, that\nClaire-Anne was by him, her dark understanding presence, her clear Greek\nface, her little smile.\n\n\"In a minute now we will come into the wind and lower a boat,\nClaire-Anne.\" And a shock of surprise came over him. She was not there.\nIt was as though he had been talking with his back turned to some one,\nand turning around found they weren't there. For an instant he felt as\nif he had lost somebody overboard. And then it came to him that water,\nearth, material hazards were nothing to her any more. She had gone\nsomewhere for a moment. And he turned to greet the pilot as he swung\naboard.\n\n\"She will come back,\" he thought.... But she never came back. Once or\ntwice or maybe three times, a month, six months, and ten months later,\nhe felt her warm lover-like presence near him. \"Claire-Anne! Is it you,\nClaire-Anne?\" And she was gone again. Something that had hovered,\nfluttered, kissed, and flown away. Never again!\n\nShe had become to him in death much more real than she had ever been in\nlife. In life she had been dynamic, a warm, multicolored, perfumed\ncloud. In death she was static. All the tumult of material things gone,\nhe had a vision of her clear as a line drawing. And he had come to\ndepend on her so much. In difficulty of thought he would say: \"Is this\nright, Claire-Anne?\" And her answer would come: \"Yes, Shane!\" Or\npossibly when some matter of trade or conduct seemed dubious, not\nquite--whatever it was, her voice would come clear as a bell. \"You\nmustn't, Shane. It isn't right. It isn't like you to be small.\" It might\nhave been conscience, but it sounded like Claire-Anne. And oftentimes in\nproblems, she would say: \"I don't know, Shane. I don't quite know.\" And\nhe would say, \"We must do our best, Claire-Anne.\"\n\nWell, she was gone. And he thought to himself: What do we know of the\ndestiny of the dead? They, too, must have work, missions to perform. The\nGod he believed in--the wise, firm, and kindly God--might have said:\n\"Claire-Anne, he'll be all right now. At any rate he'll have to work out\nthe rest for himself. Leave that. I want you to--\" And she had gone.\n\nThat was one majestic explanation, but at times it seemed to him that no\nmatter what happened in the world, or superworld, yet she must be in\ntouch with him. \"Set me, as a seal upon thy heart, as a seal upon thine\narm,\" cried the prince's daughter, \"for love is strong as death.\" If she\nloved him she must love him still.\n\nIt suddenly occurred to him that the fault was not occult, but a matter\nof spiritual deterioration in himself. To be in harmony with the lonely\ndead there must be no dross about the mind. The preoccupations of\nroutine, the occasional dislikes of some stupid ship's officer, or\nboatswain, the troubles about cargo--this, that, the other pettinesses\nmight cloud his eye as a mist clouds a lens. There came to him the\nmemory of a translation from some Chinese poet he had heard somewhere,\nin some connection:\n\n  How am I fallen from myself! For a long time now\n  I have not seen the prince of Chang in my dreams.\n\nHe decided he would clear and make ready the quiet sweet place in his\nheart, the room of ghosts, so that she might come and dwell there. But\ninduce the spiritual mood of the quiet October evening much as he could,\nyet she never came again.\n\nFrom his mind now there faded the memory of her face, the memory of her\nhands, the memory of her voice even. With every week, with every month,\nwith the year, she was gone. Like a lost thought, or a lost bar of\nmusic, she was gone. She had been there, but she was gone. The loss was\na terrible one. To lose one who was alive was much. But to lose one who\nwas dead was unbelievable, horrible ... to lose the sun ... forever....\n\nHe decided he could go back to the Prado of Marseilles, where first he\nhad met her, where she would of all places have kept a tryst with him.\nThere was no risk. The folk of the sea come and go so easily, so\ninvisibly, and French law bothers itself little about the killing of a\nwoman of evil repute.... One of the risks of the trade, they would say.\nEven had there been a risk he would have gone. He went.\n\nIt was a dark night, a night of wind with the waves lashing the shore. A\nnight of all nights to keep a tryst with a dead woman. Immense privacy\nof darkness and howling winds and lashing waves. With awe he went there,\nas a shaken Catholic might enter a cathedral, dubious of the mystery of\nthe eucharist, expecting some silent word, some invisible sign from the\ntabernacle.... He went with bowed head....\n\nShe never came.\n\nHe concentrated until all faded away, even the night, the wind, the\ninsistent waters. He might have been standing on a solitary rock in an\ninfinite dark sea, to which there was no shore. Asking, pleading,\nwilling for her.... But she never came....\n\nAnd it suddenly became inevitable to him that she would not come; and\nslowly, as a man comes slowly out of a drug into consciousness, he came\nback into the world of lights and laughter and sodden things. And\nturning on his heel without a look, he went away....\n\nHe never called to her again.... He thought over her often enough, and\nshe had never been real, he decided. His mother and his wife had been\nreal. They were their own dimensions. But she was something he had made\nin his head, as an author may create a character. She was a\nhallucination. And she had never been with him after death; that had\nbeen a mirage in the hinterland of the mind.\n\nAnd he asked: Who was she, anyway? She was a woman who said she loved\nhim, might even have believed it. Women under stress believe so many\nthings. A little anger, a little passion, a little melancholy, and\nthings resolve themselves into so many differences of color and line.\nAnd what standard of truth is there? Suppose he were to tell any man of\nthe world of the occurrence, and to ask who she was, what she was, and\nwhat he had been to her. They would have said it was simple. She was a\nharlot of Marseilles, and he was her _amant de coeur_. But the beauty\nof it! he would have objected. All the beauty was in yourself. Or as\nthey would have put it: All imagination!\n\nWhat a snare it all was, and what was truth? How much better off a man\nwas if he had never anything to do with them, and yet....\n\nA world of men, there would be something lacking! Friends he had in\nplenty, men would help him, as a ship stands by another ship at sea.\nFriends to talk to, of ships and sports, of ports and politics; but when\none left them, one was left by one's self. And all the subtleties of\nmind came again like a cloud of wasps. To each man his own problem of\nliving. To each man to decide his own escape from himself.\n\n\"And the Lord God said: It is not good that the man should be alone--\"\nthe Hebrew chronicler had imagined. No, it was not good. It was\nterrible. After the day's work was done, after the pleasant evenings of\nfriends, then came the terror of the shadows. Unreal they might be, but\nthey hurt more than real things did. Unless one sank into the\nundignified oblivion of drink, there was no escape. Shadows came.\nAcuter than the tick of a watch, they were there, the cold mother with\nthe haunting eyes, the dead wife with the sullen mouth, visible as\nstars. And empty as air was the space Claire-Anne should have occupied,\nwith her clear-cut beautiful features, her understanding eyes. Three\nghosts, and the ghost that was missing was the most terrible ghost of\nall ... He could not stand them any more.... He must not be alone....\n\n\nSection 7\n\nHe could not marry a Christian of the East, they were such an\nunspeakably treacherous race. He could not marry a Jewess, for about\neach one of the nation there seemed to be an awesome destiny, a terrible\ndoom or an ultimate majesty blinding human eyes; a wall, so high that it\nwas terrible.... He could not marry a Moslem woman, for that would mean\nacceptance of Islam. And though Islam was very fine, very clean, and\nCampbell believed in resignation, and acknowledged there was no god but\nGod, as the crypticism was, yet the Scots-Irish honesty of him would not\naccept Mohammed as the prophet of God. It would be like putting\nBonaparte above the Lord Buddha. A faith is a very solemn thing and not\nto be approached lightly. To accept a faith publicly, the tongue in the\ncheek, was the sin of insincerity and rank dishonesty, having committed\nwhich no man should hold up his head. And moreover Moslem women were\nqueer things. For centuries they had been held to be a little more\nbeautiful than a flower, a little less valuable, less personal than a\nfine horse. Being told that for centuries, they had come to believe it,\nand believing one's self to be particular leads one to become it. Moslem\nwomen, no!\n\nHe had become familiar with the Druses around Beirut. There was\nsomething in the hard independent tribesmen that reminded him of the\nUlster Scot. Aloof, unafraid, inimical, independent, with a strain of\nmysticism in them, they were somehow like the glensmen of Antrim. Fairly\nfriendly with the Moslems, contemptuous of the Latin Christians,\nimpatient of dogma, they might have been the Orangemen of Syria. Their\nemirs had a great dignity and a great simplicity, like an old-time\nHighland chief. They acknowledged God, but after that their faith ran\ninto esoteric subtleties of nature-worship, which they kept to the\ninitiates among themselves.... And the common run of them had strange\nlegends, as that in a mountain bowl of China lived tribe on tribe of\nDruses, and that one day these of Syria and of China would be reunited\nand conquer the world.... They were very dignified men, and muscular....\nTheir women had the light feet of gazelles ... One only saw their sweet\nlow foreheads, their cinnamon hands.... They claimed they were\nChristians sometimes, and other times they said they were Moslems, but\nthe truth no stranger knew.... A secret sect, like the ancient\nAssassins, who had the Old Man of the Mountain for their king.... With\nthem dwelt beauty and terror and the glamour of hidden things....\n\nTo Shane they were very kindly. They recognized him for a mountain man\nborn, and for an honest man. They could not understand him, as a\nChristian, seeing he took no part in Greek or Latin politics. They\ndecided he must have some faith of his own.... He did them some kindness\nof errands, and they were very hospitable to him....\n\nIn '61, after the massacres, when the tribesmen were preparing to\nretreat to the mountain of the Druses, he returned to find Syria\noccupied by the troops of Napoleon III and to hear that his friend\nHamadj Beg of Deir el Kour was dead in the war.... He went to condole\nwith the family.... Arif Bey, Hamadj's brother, was preparing to retreat\ntoward Damascus....\n\n\"Arif Bey,\" Campbell suddenly said, \"also this, I seek a wife.\"\n\n\"Yes.\" The grizzled Druse scratched his head, and looked at him keenly.\n\n\"I am making Lebanon my home; therefore I don't want a wife of my\ncountry. There is no people sib to me here but the Druse people....\nWould a Druse woman marry me?\"\n\n\"I--I see nothing against it.\"\n\n\"Do you know a Druse woman who would have me?\"\n\n\"Well, let me see,\" Arif said. \"There is Hamadj's daughter, Fenzile.\"\n\n\"Is she young, Arif Bey?\"\n\n\"Not so young, nineteen, but she is a mountain woman and lasts.\"\n\n\"Is she good-looking?\"\n\n\"Yes, she is very good-looking.\"\n\n\"Is she kindly?\"\n\n\"Yes, yes, I think so.\"\n\n\"Is she wild?\"\n\n\"No, She is very docile.\"\n\n\"You trust me a lot, Arif Bey.\"\n\n\"Yes, we trust you much.\"\n\n\"And I trust you, Arif Bey.... Will Fenzile marry me?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" Arif Bey decided, \"Fenzile will marry you.\"\n\n\nSection 8\n\nIt seemed to him, at thirty-five, that only now had he discovered the\nsecret of living. Not until now had his choice and destiny come together\nto make this perfect equation of life. The work he loved of the bark\n_Queen Maeve_, with her beautiful sails like a racing yacht's, her white\ndecks, her shining brass. The carrying of necessities from Britain to\nSyria, the land he loved, next to Ulster, his mother. And the carrying\nfrom Syria into harsh plain Britain of cargoes of beauty like those of\nSheba's queen, on camels that bare spices, and very much gold and\nprecious stones. And the great ancient city where he lived; not even\nDamascus, the pride of the world, exceeded it for beauty. Forward of\nmassed Lebanon, white with snow it lay, a welter of red roots and green\nfoliage--the blue water, the garlanded acacias, the roses, the sally\nbranches. Beauty! Beauty! The Arab shepherds in abbas of dark magenta,\nthe black Greek priests, the green of a pilgrim's turban, the veiled\nwomen smoking narghiles and daintly sipping sherbet, pink and yellow and\nwhite. The cry of the donkey-boy, and the cry of the cameleer, and the\ncry of the muezzin from the mosque. The quaint salutations as he passed\nalong the staired streets: _Naharkum Sayeed!_--May your day be blessed.\n_Naharaka abyad!_--May your day be white. _Allah yahtikum el\nafiyeh!_--God give health to you. They were chanted like a refrain of a\nsong.\n\nBeauty! Riot and slashing of color. Yet there was line here and massive\nproportion. The sparkling, magenta city had been the theater of great\nmarching hosts. The Phenicians had built it: \"the root of life, the\nnurse of cities, the primitive queen of the world,\" they had named her.\nAnd gone the Phenicians, and came the slim subtle Egyptians. And the\nmassive burly Assyrians came next: and now the memory of them was\nforgotten, also their love and their hatred and their envy was now\nperished. And then came the tramp of the Roman legions, Agrippa's men,\nand held the city for centuries. Justinian had one of his law schools\nthere, until the earth quaked and the scholars dispersed. And then the\nSaracens held it until Baldwin, brother of Godfrey de Bouillon, clashed\ninto it with mailed crusaders; and Baldwin, overcome with the beauty of\nthe land, took him a paynim queen. And then came the occult reign of the\nDruse. And then the Turk.\n\nAnd St. George had killed the Dragon there, after the old monk's tale.\n\nShane Campbell was never weary of looking at the inscriptions on the\ngreat cliffs at the River of the Dog--the strange beauty of that name!\nIt was like the place-names of native Ulster--_Athbo_, the Ford of Cows,\n_Sraidcuacha_, the Cuckoo's Lane--one name sounded to the other like\ntuning-forks. And the sweet strange harmony of it filled his heart, so\nthat he could understand the irresistible charm of Lebanon--the high\nclear note like a bird's song. Here was the sun and the dreams of mighty\nthings, and the palpable proximity of God. Here was beauty native, to be\npicked like a nugget, not to be mined for in bitter hours of torment and\ndistress.\n\nHigh, clear, sustained, the note held. Arose the moon and the great\nstars like spangles. The slender acacias murmured. The pines\n_hush-hushed_. The _bronhaha_ of the cafes was like a considered\ncounterpoint. Everywhere was harmony; beauty. And there would be no\ndepression. It would last. There would be no ghosts. They were\nexorcised. For now there was Fenzile. How understandable everything was!\nIt must have been under a moon like this, under these Syrian stars, to\nthe _hush-hush-hush_ of the pine and the rustle of willow branches, that\nSolomon the king sang his love-song. And it must have been to one whose\nbody was white as Fenzile's, to eyes as emerald, to velvety lips, to\nslim hands with orange-tinted finger nails that he sang. Surely the\nShulamite was not fairer than the Fenzile, daughter of Hamadj, a Druse\nemir!\n\n  How beautiful are thy feet with shoes, O prince's daughter!\n  The joints of thy thighs are like jewels,\n  The work of the hands of a cunning workman.\n  Thy navel is like a round goblet,\n  Which wanteth not liquor:\n  Thy belly is like an heap of wheat set about with lilies.\n  Thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins.\n  Thy neck is like a tower of ivory:\n  Thine eyes like the fishpools in Heshbon,\n  By the gate of Bath-rabbim:\n  Thy nose is as the tower of Lebanon which looketh toward Damascus.\n  Thine head upon thee is like Carmel,\n  And the hair of thine head like purple;\n  The king is held in the galleries.\n  How fair and pleasant art thou,\n  O love, for delights!\n  This thy stature is like to a palm tree.\n  And thy breasts to clusters of grapes.\n\n  I said, I will go up to the palm tree.\n  I will take hold of the boughs thereof:\n  Now also thy breasts shall be as clusters of the vine,\n  And the smell of thy nose like apples;\n  And the roof of thy mouth like the best wine for my beloved,\n  That goeth down sweetly,\n  Causing the lips of those that are asleep to speak....\n\n\nSection 9\n\nWhere before he had made his mistake with women was allowing them to\nbecome spiritually important. His mother had been important; he had\nsuffered from the sense of her lack of heart to him. His wife had been\nimportant; they hadn't understood life together, he made no attempt\nto.... They were so young.... And Claire-Anne had become spiritually\nimportant to him. So that when she was gone, it was hell.\n\nIf he had treated his mother casually, depending on his uncles, it would\nhave been all right. If he had discerned--and he had discerned, though\nhe knew not how to act--that his wife and he would forever be\ninharmonious, it would not have been a scar on his youth. If he had gone\nfor instance to Alan Donn and said, \"Uncle Alan, I'm afeared there's a\nmistake been made. And what are we going to do about this woman o'\nLouth?\" And Alan would have said: \"I ken't well you were a damned young\nfool. Ah, well, gang off aboard your boatie, and I'll see to her.\" Alan\nwould have ditched her and her mother mercilessly, and there would have\nbeen no scar on his youth....\n\nAnd Claire-Anne, had he only taken her as he should have taken her, as a\nlight love, easily gotten, to be taken easily, instead of tragedizing\nuntil his fingers were scarlet.... God!... Yes, where before he had made\nhis mistakes with women was allowing them to become spiritually\nimportant.\n\nWell, he wouldn't do that with Fenzile. He knew better now. Keep the\nheart free. Let there be beauty and graciousness and kindliness, but\nkeep the heart free, and ask for no heart. All tragedies were internal,\nall the outward deeds being only as sounds. Keep the heart free.\n\nThere were so many aspects to her. She was like a bird about the house,\ngaily colored, of bright song. He loved to see her move here and there,\nwith movements as of music. And she was like a child at times, as she\nsolemnly made sherbets--very like a child she was, intense, simple. And\nshe was like a young relative; there was emptiness in the house as she\nwent, and when she came back it was like a bird singing.\n\nAnd she was so beautiful about the place, with her eyes green of the\nsea, her dusky velvet lips, her slim cinnamon hands, with the dramatic\norange tinting on the nails. Always was some new beauty in her, a tilt\nof the head, a sudden gracious pose. She was like some piece of warm\nstatuary. From any angle came beauty, shining as the sun.\n\nAnd in the dusk when his arms were about her, she was no longer child,\nrelative, or statue. She was woman, vibrant woman. Tensed muscles and a\nlittle stifled moan. And an emotional sob, maybe, or a tear glistening\non her cheek. Relaxation, and a strange, easy dignity. With her arms\nabout her white knees, her little head upraised, thoughts seemed to be\ngoing and coming from her like bees in and out of their straw skep. And\noften he was tempted to ask her what she was thinking of. But he stopped\nhimself in time. Of course she was thinking of nothing at all, barring\npossibly a new sherbet to be made, or whether, if they sold Fatima, the\nAbyssinian cook, who was becoming garrulous, would Fatima have a good\nhome. Trifles! What was the use of asking her? And here was another\npossibility. She might--anything was possible--be in some deep subtle\nthought, into which, if he asked, he might get enmeshed, or be trapped\nemotionally. Better not ask. He wanted to know nothing of her heart, and\nto keep his.\n\nHe loved her in a happy guarded way. And she loved him. When he came\nback after a voyage she looked at him with an amazed joy. \"O Zan! Zan,\ndear! Is it you? Is it really you?\" She would rush and hold him. What\namazing strength her little arms had! And she would stand back and look\nat him again. \"O Zan! Zan!\" And she would bury her perfumed head in his\nshoulder to hide the glad tears. \"O Zan!\"\n\n\"Do you know why I love you so much, Zan dear?\" she once said.\n\n\"Why, Fenzile?\"\n\n\"Because you are so big, and yet you are so gentle. And you wouldn't do\na little thing, my Zan.\"\n\n\"Don't be foolish, Fenzile!\"\n\n\"I am not foolish.\"\n\nOnly once she asked him how he loved her.\n\n\"I wonder--how much do you love me, my Zan?\"\n\n\"Oh, lots, Fenzile. A terrible lot.\" And he smiled.\n\n\"As much as you do your ship?\"\n\n\"Yes, as much as I do my ship.\"\n\n\"That is a lot, Zan.... Zan, would you miss me, if I should die?\"\n\n\"I should miss you terribly.\"\n\n\"If you died, I should die, too.\" Her voice quavered.\n\n\"Don't be silly. Of course you wouldn't.\"\n\n\"Don't you think I would?\" And she laughed with him one of her rare,\nrare laughs. And that was the way it all should end, in pretty laughter.\nLet there be none of this horrible emotionalism, this undignified welter\nof thought and feeling. Kindness of eyes, and pleasantness of body, but\nkeep the heart away. Let them be--how? There wasn't a word in English,\nor in Gaidhlig to express it; in French there was--_des amis_, not _des\namants_. Let them be that. Let there be no involution of thought and\nmind about it. Let there be this time no mistake.... Where before he had\nmade his mistake with women was allowing them to become spiritually\nimportant....\n\n\nSection 10\n\nInto this idyl of Beirut came now the wrestler from Aleppo, Ahmet Ali,\nand the occurrence irritated Campbell to a degree which he had not\nconceived possible. There he passed the door with his dreamy Syrian\nface, his red rose, his white burnoose, his straggling followers. And\nFenzile smiled her quiet aloof smile.\n\nThere might be amusement in it, a queer Eastern comedy of the mountebank\nwho raised his eyes to a Druse princess, and wife of a Frank ship's\nmaster. It might be amusing to Fenzile to see this conqueror of men\nconquered by her presence, but it wasn't dignified. By God! it wasn't\ndignified.\n\nBut it wasn't dignified to talk about it. To show Fenzile that it\nmattered a tinker's curse to him. So he said nothing, and the wrestler\nwent by every day. It was becoming intolerable. It seemed to amuse\nFenzile, but it didn't amuse him.\n\nAnd suddenly a chill smote him. What did he know of these people of the\nEast anyhow? In six years one could learn their language perfectly,\nknow their customs, know themselves, but know only as much as they\nwanted to be known. The outer person, which is hallucination, one might\nknow, but what of the inner, which is reality? A strange country, where\nthe merchants spoke like princes and the princes like cameleers, and the\n_sakyeh_, the water-carrier, might quote some fancy of Hafiz, as the\nwater gurgled from the skin. The obedience, the resignation in the\nwomen's eyes might cover intrigue, and what was behind the eyes of the\nmen, soft as women's?\n\n\"Fenzile, you say you love me, because I am kind. Don't you love me\nbecause I am strong?\"\n\n\"Anyway, anyhow, dear Zan.\"\n\n\"I am strong, you know. As strong as your friend, Ahmet Ali.\"\n\n\"Of course, dear Zan.\" But somehow her tone did not carry conviction. If\nshe understood there was nothing this wrestler had he did not have\nbetter, it would have been all right. All attributes in the world would\nhave been for her in him. But she thought the wrestler was strong. Damn\nwomen! Couldn't they understand the difference between the muscles of a\nhunting leopard and the bulk of a sea-cow? It was silly, but it\nirritated him.\n\nAnd then a thought came to him that he felt degraded him, but of which\nhe could not rid himself, try as he would. What did he know of Fenzile,\nbarring that she was young and strong and beautiful? Nothing. Of what\nwas she thinking in those dreamy eyes, green of the sea? And women\nalways admired strength in a man. And he was away most of the time, half\nanyway. And the breath of the East was intrigue.\n\n\"Oh, don't be rotten,\" he told himself. But the occasional hot and\nsearing pain remained, and the little black cloud was in his mind. When\nthey were close in the soft gloom, shoulder to shoulder, her eyes\nclosed, her slim cinnamon hands clenched, pain stabbed him like a knife.\nAnd in the gay mornings, when she was arranging her flowers in vases of\nPersian blue, it made him silent as the grave. And in the evening when\nshe was doing her subtle Syrian broideries, it aroused in him queer\ngusts of controlled fury.... Could it be possible? A mountebank.... And\nthe \"Thousand and One Nights\" began with _Shah Zamon's_ queen and her\nlove for the blackamoor slave....\n\nIf the wrestler would only go away, become tired of parading, and\nFenzile would tire of smiling.... And later on Campbell would laugh....\n\nBut the wrestler stayed, and many times Campbell met him in the streets,\nand each time was exaggerated, insulting courtesy from the Aleppo man,\nas he drew aside to let the Frank pass. There was hostility and contempt\nin his veiled eyes.... There nonchalance in his smelling of the rose ...\nCampbell passed by frigidly, as if the man weren't there, and all the\ntime his blood was boiling.... But what was one to do? One could not\nmake a scene before the riff-raff of Syria. And besides, there was too\nmuch of a chance of a knife in the back.... Franks were cheap these\ndays, and it would be blamed on the war of the Druses....\n\nArgue with himself as much as he could, it was intolerable. It was\nsilly, but it was intolerable.... To think of another caressing that\nperfumed hair, of another kissing the palm of that slim hand, of another\nseeing those sleek, sweet shoulders....\n\nWas he jealous ...? No, irritated, just, he told himself. Was he in love\nwith her himself? Of course not. She wasn't close enough to him for\nthat.... Then why ...?\n\nOh, damn it! He didn't know why, but it was just intolerable....\n\n\nSection 11\n\nThe bark was in the open roadstead, cargo all ready, Levantine pilot on\nboard. A reaching breeze from the north and all favorable. And when he\nwould get home to Liverpool, he had a design to spend a few weeks in\nUlster.... The roads would be glistening with frost there, and the\npleasant Ulster moon at the full.... The turf would be nearly black, and\nbare as a board, and there would be coursing of hares ... November\nmists, and the trees red and brown.... Eh, hard Ulster, pleasant Ulster!\n\nHe should have been happy, as he made his way down the Beirut streets to\ngo aboard, leaving the land of his adoption for the land of his birth,\nleaving pleasant Fenzile for the shrewd pleasantry of his own folk.... A\nlittle while of Ulster and he would be coming back again.... One's heart\nshould lift the glory of the world, the bold line of Ulster and the\nlavish color of Syria; the sincere, dour folk of Ulster and the warmth\nof Fenzile.... He should have left so warmly. \"In a little while,\ndearest, I'll be back and my heart will speak to your twin green eyes.\"\n\"Yes, Zan. I'll be here.\" But he had left dourly. And Fenzile had\nwatched him go with quivering lip.... Oh, damn himself for his\nsuspicions, for his annoyance, and damn the fatuous Arab fool for\narousing them.... Christ, if only he had that fellow on board ship. And\nsuddenly he met him, with his attendants and hangers-on. The wrestler\ndrew aside with his insolent smile. Campbell's temper broke loose.\n\n\"Listen, O certain person,\" he insulted the Aleppo man, \"there is a\nstreet in Beirut down which it does not please me to see you go.\"\n\n\"Will the foreign gentleman tell me,\" the wrestler's voice drawled, and\nhe smelled his rose, \"who will stop a Moslem from going down a Moslem\nstreet?\"\n\n\"By God, I would!\" The Syrians of Ahmet Ali's escort gathered around,\nsmiling.\n\n\"The foreign gentleman forgets that I am the wrestler from Aleppo.\"\n\n\"Just so. I happen to be a bit of a wrestler myself.\"\n\n\"Some day perhaps the foreign gentleman will condescend to try a fall\nwith me.\"\n\nSyrians, Egyptians, Turks, were pouring from all quarters. Six French\nsoldiers, walking gapingly along the bazaars, stopped wonderingly.\n\n\"Dites, les soldats,\" Shane called. \"Vous ne voulez pas voir quelque\nchose d'interessant?\"\n\n\"Mais si, Monsieur!\"\n\n\"Eh bien, je vais lutter contre l'homme avec la rose. C'est un lutteur\narabe. Voulez-vous-y assister?\"\n\n\"Mais, pour bien sur, Monsieur.\"\n\n\"All right, then, by God!\" Shane looked square at Ahmet Ali. \"We'll\nwrestle right here and now.\"\n\n\"But the stones, the street,\" Ahmet Ali looked surprised. \"You might get\nhurt.\"\n\n\"We'll wrestle here and now.\"\n\n\"Oh, all right.\" The Arab lifted an expressive shoulder. Carefully he\nremoved the great white robe and handed it to an attendant. To another\nhe gave the rose. Shane handed his coat and hat to a saturnine French\ncorporal. Ahmet Ali took his shirt off. Kicked away his sandals. There\nwas the dramatic appearance of an immense bronze torso. The Syrians\nsmiled. The French soldiers looked judicially grave. Ahmet Ali stood\ntalking for an instant with one of his men, a lean bilious-seeming Turk.\nThe Turk was urging something with eagerness. The wrestler's soft girl's\nface had concentrated into a mask of distaste. He was shaking his head.\nHe didn't like something.\n\n\"How God-damned long are you going to keep me here?\"\n\nAhmet turned. There was a smile on his face, as of amused, embarrassed\ntoleration. He was like a great athlete about to box with a small boy.\nAnd the boy in earnest.\n\n\"Ready?\" he asked.\n\n\"Any time,\" Shane snapped.\n\n\"All right.\"\n\nVery easily he came forward over the cobbled street. He was like some\nimmense bronze come suddenly to life and shambling. Like the brazen\nservant Thomas Aquinas made under the influence of particular stars. His\ngreat brown shoulders, his barreled chest, his upper arms like a man's\nleg, his packed forearms, his neck like a bull's, his shaven head. All\nseemed superhuman, and then came his shy embarrassed smile, his troubled\neyes. One felt he hated to do this....\n\nHe dropped suddenly, easily, into his wrestler's crouch. His shoulders\nswayed lightly. He pawed like a bear.\n\nCampbell stood easily, left foot forward, like a boxer. His left arm\nshot out suddenly. The heel of his hand stopped, jolted, Ahmet on the\nchin. The Syrian shook his head. Pawed again. Campbell slapped him on\nthe forearms, jolted him again on the chin, broke away easily to the\nright. Ahmet's brown forehead frowned. \"Don't be childish,\" he seemed to\nchide Campbell. The crowd pressed. The French soldiers rapped them back\nwith the scabbard of their sidearms. _En arriere, les puants, en\narriere!_ \"Back, sons of polecats, get back.\" The scabbards clacked like\nslapsticks.\n\nAhmet Ali stood up straighter. He wanted to get away from that annoying\nhand on his chin. His forearms moved faster now, like brown pistons.\nThere was a slight frown on his face. He was becoming impatient. Shane\nbroke again to the right. Ahmet followed, his immense hands poised.\nCampbell feinted for the chin again with his left hand. The wrestler's\nsmile flickered. His right arm went out in guard. Campbell shifted,\ncaught the brown wrist in his right hand, his left hand shot forward to\nthe chin again. He brought forward all his forces to twisting that\ngigantic arm. He held the Syrian locked. The right arm began to give. If\nhe could only shift his feet, get some sort of leverage. But how in\nGod's name, how? How could he get behind. With an immense wrench of\nshoulders Ahmet got free. He stood for an instant, nursing his numbed\nwrist. He nodded and grinned. \"That wasn't bad,\" he seemed to say. The\nlean bilious Turk on the edge of the crowd began talking viciously. The\nsaturnine French corporal turned and smacked him terribly across the\nnose with the edge of the scabbard of his bayonet. \"_Et-ta soeur!_\" He\nhad the air of a schoolmaster reproving a refractory pupil. But his\nlanguage was obscene and his blow broke the man's nose.... He vouchsafed\nno further interest in the Turk, but turned to watch the wrestling,\ntwirling an oiled mustache....\n\nThe Syrian closed his mouth, breathed heavily through his nostrils. His\nbrow corrugated. His eyes became pinpoints. He was a workman out to do a\njob. He began to weave in, his brown arms describing slow arabesques.\nThe crowd around became oppressively silent. They breathed hissingly.\n\nShane feinted, dodged, broke away. Doggedly Ahmet Ali followed. Faster\nthan time, Shane's right hand shot out and gripped the wrestler's right\nwrist. His right foot hooked around the Syrian's right ankle. He pulled\ndownward with sudden, vicious effort. Ali crashed forward on his face, a\ngreat brown hulk like an overturned bronze statue. Shane stooped down\nfor either the half-Nelson and hammer-lock, or full Nelson.... An\ninstant too long of hesitation. Light as a lightweight acrobat Ahmet\nAli had rolled aside, put palm to ground, sprung to his feet. His face\nwas bloody, his right knee shook. With the back of his hand he wiped the\nblood from his eyes. There was a twitter from the Syrians. The wrestler\nlumbered forward again.... A little quake of fear came into Campbell's\nbeing. There was an impersonal doggedness about the wrestler from\nAleppo's eyes, a sense of inevitability.... Shane's eyes shifted, right\nand left....\n\nThen suddenly, the wrestler had him....\n\nHe felt a twirl to his shoulder, and then he was pinioned by two immense\nbrown arms. They caught him above the elbows around the chest. First\nthey were like boys' arms, light. They became firm as calipers. They\nsettled, snugged. Then they tightened slowly, with immense certainty.\nThere was something about it like the rise of the tide. A gigantic cable\naround his chest. At his shoulder-blades the Syrian's pectoral muscles\npressed like shallow knobs of steel. His arms began to hurt. His\nbreathing began to be hard with every output of breath. The arms\ntightened.... All his vitality was flying through his opened mouth....\nHe hit futilely with his knuckles at the rope-like sinews of the brown\nforearms.... His head throbbed like drums.... In an instant he would be\nlike a bag bound midways ... his ribs giving like saplings in the wind\n... Lights danced....\n\nStupidly he looked down at the clasped hands, and a sudden fury of\nfighting came on him.... Something terrible, sinister, cold. His free\nhands caught the Syrian's little finger, tugged, pulled, bent, tore....\nHe wanted to shred it from its hand.... Rip it like silk.... He felt the\ngreat arms about him quiver, grow uncertain.... Tear, tear!...\n\nWith a little whine like a dog's, the wrestler let go.... He nursed the\nfinger for an instant like a hurt child.... Opening and shutting the\nhand.... Looking worried.... Great waves of air came into Shane's\nchest.... His knees were weak.... The Syrian walked around an instant,\nthinking, worrying.... He was serious now.... Suddenly he plunged....\n\nBut swifter than Ahmet's plunge was thought and memory.... Of a day at\nNagasaki ... of a little brown smiling Japanese and a burly square-head\nsailorman.... Of the Japanese's courteous explanation in smiling\nPidgin.... With luck and timing he could do it.... Fast, but not too\nfast, and steady.... Handsomely, as the ship-word was.... There!\n\nThe hands trained to whipping lanyards caught Ahmet's wrists as he\nplunged. Shane's right leg went outward, foot sunk home. Backward he\nfell, leg taunt, hands pulling. Above him Ahmet's great bulk soared,\nhurtled grotesquely. For an instant; a flash.... The squeals of startled\nSyrians, the panic of feet.... Then a crash, an immense crash....\n\nA long shuddering, frightened _eh_ from the crowd.... A French soldier\nmumbling ... \"_'Cre nom de nom de nom de nom de Jesus Chri!_\"\n\nHe staggered to his feet, put his hand to his face.... It came away\ndripping.... His face was like the leeward deck of a flying yacht ...\nswimming.... A few feet away Syrians and French soldiers were milling\nover ... something.... The corporal wrenched Shane's arms into his coat.\nPushed his hat into his hands.\n\n\"_Courez donc, le citoyen_.... Come on, get away.... Get....\"\n\n\"Is he dead?\"\n\n\"No, not dead.... But get away.... He'll never wrestle again.... _Vite,\nalors!_\"\n\nHe pushed him down the street.\n\n\"But----\"\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\"Go on. We can take care of ourselves....\" He shoved him roughly\nforward.... Shane staggered, walked, ran a little.... Behind him a\nfew blocks away, an ominous hum. He ran on.... Some one was\nshrieking....\n\n\"_Ma hala ya ma hala Kobal en Nosara_.... How sweet, oh, how sweet, to\nkill the Christians....\" The crack of a gun.... Tumult.... The long\nMoslem war-song.... Two rifles. \"_A nous, les Francais_.... _A nous, la\nLegion_!\"\n\nA nausea, a great weakness, an utter contempt for himself came over him\nin the boat pulling him toward his ship ... God! He had fought with and\nnearly killed--possibly killed--a man for personal hatred! From\nirritation, and in a public place! A spectacle for donkey-boys and\nriff-raff of French towns.... He tottered on the ship's ladder.... The\nsailors caught him. The mate ran up.\n\n\"Anything wrong, sir? You look like a ghost.\"\n\n\"No, nothing. All aboard? Everything ready? Is she a-drawing? Anchor\na-peak? All right. Get her up....\"\n\n\nSection 12\n\n\"Arif Bey, where is my wife? I come back to Beirut. I find my house\ndeserted. My servants gone. Where is Fenzile? Is she here?\"\n\n\"No, son.\"\n\n\"Is she dead?\"\n\n\"No--no, son, I wish she were....\"\n\n\"Then where is she gone? With whom?\"\n\n\"Trebizond. Stamboul. Cairo. I don't know where.\"\n\n\"With whom?\"\n\n\"With--oh, don't bother yourself, son. Forget her.\"\n\n\"With whom? I must know.\"\n\n\"With--do you remember that wrestler you crippled, the wrestler from\nAleppo?\"\n\n\"With Ahmet Ali! Impossible! I all but killed him.\"\n\n\"She went, though....\"\n\n\"No, uncle, no. If he had been strong she might, but,--\"\n\nThe old Druse chief shook his head, smiled in his beard, a little,\nbitter, wise smile.\n\n\"You were never sick with her, never poor.\"\n\n\"No, never sick, never poor.\"\n\n\"Well, he was sick and poor, so she went with him.\"\n\n\"Then she loved him all along.\"\n\n\"No, son Zan, she loved you--until you threw him. She might have been\namused at seeing him pass the house, laugh a little, be flattered....\nSuch a big fool, and she a little woman.... But she would never have\nleft you....\"\n\n\"But she did.\"\n\n\"Well ... after the fall, he had no friends ... the Christians despised\nhim, the Moslems hated him.... There was no train to follow him ... he\nwent on crutches.... He passed her door and looked, and looked.... What\ncould she do but come out.... It was her fault, after all.... And she\nwas very tender-hearted....\"\n\n\"Tender-hearted?\"\n\n\"Didn't you know?\"\n\n\"No, I never knew.\"\n\n\"She used to cry when the leaves fell from the trees.... You didn't know\nyour wife well?\"\n\n\"No, sir, I did not.\"\n\n\"Well, she is gone, Zan.... Where, one doesn't know.... What will become\nof her, one doesn't know. Destiny is like a blind camel. He doesn't know\nagainst what he stumbles. We do not see him come.... Only when the harm\nis done, do we say: We might have listened for the tinkle of his\nbell.... Eh, one is young and does everything and sees nothing. One is\nold and sees everything and does nothing. There is no mystery ... only\nignorance....\"\n\n\"You say she was very tender-hearted, my uncle. I didn't know.... I\nthought of her as something else....\"\n\n\"Son Zan, you had better forget her in another woman. Listen son, I will\ngive you Aziyed in marriage, my own daughter. She is just as pretty and\nyounger and not so foolish as Fenzile.\"\n\n\"Oh, no, sir. No!\"\n\n\"Well, I don't blame you.\"\n\n\"It isn't that, Arif Bey. It isn't that. I'm very beholden to you ...\nfor your kindness ... and your patience.... I didn't know.... And I\nthought I knew everything nearly, and am so ignorant.... Why until now I\ndidn't know even this--the sun shone so brightly, and life was so\npleasant, I thought that was the way of life.... But I was in love with\nFenzile.... And that was what made everything so wonderful ... in love\nwith the wife you gave me ... head over heels, sir ... just simply--head\nover heels....\"\n\n\n\n\nPART FIVE\n\nTHE VALLEY OF THE BLACK PIG\n\n\nSection 1\n\nTo him, for a long time now, the sea had been only water. All the\nimmense pelagic plain, dotted with ships; with bergs of ice, like\ncathedrals; with waves that curled or swept in huge rhythms; with\ncurrents defined in lines and whorls; with gulls that mewed and whales\nthat blew like pretty fountains; with the little Portuguese men-of-war;\nwith the cleaving of flying fish and the tumbling of dolphins, all this\nwas water. All this joyous green, this laughing white, the deep\nreflective blue, the somber exquisite gray, was water. An infinity of\nbarrels of water, immense vats of water, water, wet water....\n\nTo him, for a long time now, a ship had been a means of keeping afloat\non water, of going from place to place. All its brave strakes, its\nplunging bows, its healing beams, were wood, such as one makes a house\nof, or a tinker's cart. All the miracle of sails; the steady foresail;\nthe sensitive jibs; the press canvas delicate as bubbles; the reliable\nmain; the bluff topsails; topgallants like eager horses; the\nimpertinent skysails; the jaunty moonraker, were just canvas stretched\non poles. All the pyramidal wonder of them, fore, main, and mizzen, were\nnot like a good rider's hands to a horse; compelling, coaxing, curbing\nthe wind, they were utilities. The spinning wheel was a mechanical\ndevice. Port was left, and starboard only the right hand. The chiming of\nthe ship's bell was not an old sweet ceremony but a fallible thing, not\nexact as the ticking of a cheap watch. And \"The lights are burning\nbright, sir,\" was not a paean of comfort, but a mechanical artisans'\nphrase....\n\nTo him, for a long time now, they who went down to the sea in ships were\nmen only; men such as sell things in shops or scrub poorhouse floors, or\ndig tracks for a railroad. The slovenly Achill man, who would face death\nwith a grin, the shambling Highlander who on occasion could spring to\nthe shrouds like a cat; the old bos'un who had been for years a castaway\non Tierra del Fuego; the wizened chantey-man with his melodeon, who\ncould put new vigor into tired backs, with his long-drag chanteys, like\n\"Blow the Man Down,\" and \"Dead Horse,\" and \"Whisky Johnnie,\" and\nshort-drags like \"Paddy Doyle\" and \"Haul the Bowline,\" and capstans like\n\"Homeward Bound\" and \"Wide Missouri,\" and pumping chanteys like \"Storm\nAlong\"; the keen men at the wheel and the hawk-eyed lookout; the sailor\nswinging the lead in the bows, with a wrist and forearm of steel--all\nthese were only men, following the sea because they knew no better. And\nthe mate who would wade into a mob of twenty with swinging fists, and\nthe navigator who could calculate to a hair's-breadth where they were by\nobserving the unimaginable stars--they were not of the craft of Noah,\nthey were men who knew their job ... just men ... as a ticket-clerk on a\nrailroad is a man....\n\nTo him, for a long time now, ports were ports, only places whither one\nwent to get or deliver cargo. Baltimore, like some sweet old lady; Para,\nheavy, sinister with rain; Rio, like some sparkling jewel; Belfast,\ndour, efficient, sincere; Hamburg, dignified, _gemuetlich_; Lisbon, quiet\nas a cathedral--they were not entities, they were just collections of\nhouses covering men and women. And men were either fools or crooks, and\nwomen were either ugly bores or pretty--bitches.... Men and women, they\nwere born crudely, as a calf is born of a cow, they lived foolishly or\nmeanly, and they died.... And they were hustled out of the house\nquickly.... They thought themselves so important, and they lacked the\nfaithfulness of the dog, the cleanliness of wild animals, the strength\nof horses, the beauty of tropic birds, the mathematical science of the\nspider, the swiftness of fishes.... And they grew old abominably, the\nwomen's breasts falling, the men getting pot-bellies.... How the devil\nhad they ever arrogated to themselves the lordship of created things?\n\nTo him, for a long time now, the world had been, was, one mean\nstreet....\n\n\nSection 2\n\nOf all cities, none was better calculated to foster this mood of his\nthan the one to which his business now brought him--Buenos Aires on the\nPlate. Leaving Liverpool with steel and cotton, there was an immensity\nof ocean to be traversed, until one came to the river mouth. Then fifty\nleagues of hard sailing to the abominable anchorage....\n\nHere now was a city growing rich, ungracefully--a city of arrogant\nSpanish colonists, of poverty-stricken immigrants, of down-trodden lower\nclasses ... a city of riches ... a city of blood.... Here mud, here\nmoney....\n\nInto a city half mud hovels, half marble-fronted houses, gauchos drove\nherd upon herd of cattle, baffled, afraid. Here Irish drove streams of\ngray bleating sheep. Here ungreased bullock carts screamed. From the\nblue-grass pampas they drove them, where the birds sang, and water\nrippled, where was the gentleness of summer rain, where was the majesty\nof great storms, clouds magnificently black and jagged lightning, where\nwere great white moons and life-giving suns, where was the serpent in\nthe grass, and the unique tree, where were swift horses.... Beeves that\nhad once been red awkward calves, and then sullen, stupid little\nbullocks, and then proud young bulls, with graceful horns.... Such as\nearnest Christians believed had lowed at the manger of Christ born in\nBethlehem.... And stupid, suspicious sheep, that had once been white\ngamboling lambs, playful as pups, and so ridiculously innocent\nlooking!--didn't they call their Lord _Agnus Dei_, Lamb of God?--and\ngentle ewes and young truculent rams, like red-headed schoolboys, eager\nfor a fray, and shamefaced wethers.... And by their thousands and their\ntens of thousands they drove them into Buenos Aires, and slew them for\ntheir hides....\n\nBut this was sentimental, Shane said. Bullocks and sheep must die, and\nthe knife is merciful as any death. But oughtn't these things be done\nby night, privily, as they should bury the dead? Must they drive down\nthese infinities of creatures, and slaughter them openly and callously,\nuntil the air was salt with blood, until the carrion crows hovered over\nthe city in battalions? Had they no feeling, had they no shame? Must the\npitiful machinery of life be exposed so airily?\n\nOf course it must, he knew. These things had to be done in bulk. Now\nweren't the middle ages when one killed a cow because one had to eat:\none killed a sheep because the winter was coming when woolens were\nneeded. All Europe needed shoes, saddles, combs, anti-macassars,\nafghans--what not? And Europe was a big place, so in bulk they must\nbellow and bleat and die, and have their hides torn from their pitiful\nbodies, salted, and chucked in the hold of a ship.\n\nOf course it must. That was civilization.\n\n\nSection 3\n\nFrom long ago, from far away, came the chime of old romance, but very\nthin, like the note of a warm silver bell, that could not hold its own\nagainst this blatancy. Came ancient immortal names--Magellan, that hound\nof the world, whining fiercely, nosing for openings that he might\nencircle the globe, he had been up the silver river. Sebastian Cabot,\ntoo, the grim marauder, seeking to plunder the slender Indians, he had\nbeen here. It was he had christened the great stream--Rio de la Plata,\nthe river where silver is. And Pedro Gomez, who headed the greatest\nexpedition the Argentine ever saw, and founded and named the city. And\nfighting Beresford, the British general who took it from Spain, and\nWhitelock who lost it again.... Campbell could see his bluff grenadiers,\ntheir faces blackened with powder, their backs to the wall, a strange\nland, a strange enemy, and blessed England so far away.... And the last\nof the Spanish viceroys, with a name like an organ peal, Baltazar\nHidalgo de Cisneros y Latorre--a great gentleman, he had been wounded\nfighting Nelson off Cape Trafalgar. Campbell could almost see his white\nSpanish face, his pointed fingers, his pointed beard, his pontifical\nwalk.... And of them nothing remained. Nothing of Magellan, nothing of\nCabot, nothing of Gomez, nothing of staunch Beresford, or bluff John\nWhitlock, or of the great hidalgo.... _Stat magni nominis umbra?_ ...\nNo, not even that. The shadows of the great names had gone. The dim\nchime of a silver bell drowned by the lowing of dying cattle, by the\nscreech of bullock-carts, by the haggling of merchants over the price of\nhides....\n\nBut he could not remain on board ship in port. Ships, he had enough of\nthem! There was nothing to do but go ashore, landing at high tide at one\nof the two lugubrious piers, and make his way toward the squares ...\npast the blazing water-front where the prostitutes chanted like demented\nsavages, past the saloons where the sailors drank until they dropped, or\nwere knifed, or robbed, or crimped. Down the ill-lit streets, which must\nbe trodden carefully, lest one should stumble into a heap of refuse.\nDown to the Plaza Victoria, with its dim arcades, or to the 25 de Mayo,\nwith its cathedral, its stunted paradise trees. And from the houses came\nshafts of light, and the sound of voices, thump of guitars like little\ndrums, high arguments, shuffle of cards.... Dark shadows and lonely\nimmigrants, and the plea of some light woman's bully--\"_cosa\nocculta_....\" A dim watery moon, the portico of the cathedral, a woman\nexaggerating her walk.... Pah!... immigrants fearful of the coming\nsnow.... A vigilante strutting like a colonel.... Mournful pampa\nwinds....\n\nThe theaters? Sugary Italian opera; a stark Spanish drama, too intense\nfor any but Latins, foreign; debauched vaudeville, incredibly vulgar; or\nat the concert-hall, sentimental Teutonic and Anglo-Saxon songs, with an\naudience of grave uncritical exiles--a little pathetic. No!\n\nThe clubs? Oh, damn the clubs! A blaze of light and raucous voices,\nships' masters, ships' chandlers, merchants, discussing the riddle of\nlocal politics, and the simony of office; or the price of hides, and\nfreight charges; how a ship's master could turn a pretty penny in\nbringing out shoddy clothes, or pianos--Jesus! they were crazy for\npianos here! Rattle of glasses and striking of matches. Bluff,\nceremonious salutations.\n\n\"Well, captain, what kind of a trip did you make out?\"\n\n\"Pretty fair, captain.\"\n\n\"Will you have a little snifter, captain?\"\n\n\"Well, captain, seeing that it's you--\"\n\n\"Paddy, a little of what ails him for the captain--\"\n\nAnd after a while the whisky would dissolve the ceremony, and would come\nnauseating intimacies.\n\n\"We shipped a stewardess in Hull--\" or \"There was an Irish girl in the\nsteerage, a raving beauty, and when I saw her, I said: Wait. So--\"\n\nThey were all the same. Give them whisky and time and the talk would\ncome around to easy money and easy women. All were the same, bluff,\nsentimental, animal, all but the one or two hawk-eyed, close-lipped men\nwho came and went silently, who drank little and drank by themselves.\nThese men made the really big money, but it wasn't easy; they took a\nchance with their lives, smuggling slaves from Africa for the Argentine\nplantations, or silver from Chile and Peru. But as for the rest, easy\nmoney, easy women!\n\nWell, what was Campbell fussing about? Wasn't he too making easy money,\nbringing agricultural steel and cotton goods here and taking away his\ntally of hides?\n\nAnd as to easy women, wasn't there Hedda Hagen?\n\n\nSection 4\n\nA ship's master had introduced him to her at a band concert in one of\nthe public squares--a tall Amazonian woman with her hair white as corn,\nand eyes the strange light blue of ice. Her head was uptilted--a\nbrave woman. The introduction had a smirking ceremony about it that\ndefined Froken Hagen's position as though in so many words. Her bow was\nas distant to Shane as his salutation was curt to her. Shane was\nsuddenly annoyed.\n\n[Illustration]\n\nThe captain of the American boat talked incessantly while the band\nblared on. Strolling Argentines eyed the woman's blond beauty at a\nrespectful distance. They trotted to and fro. They loped. They postured.\nShe paid no attention. To her they were nonexistent. To the American\nskipper's conversation she replied only with a flicker of the eyelids, a\nfleeting smile of her lips. Shane she seemed to ignore. She was so\nclean, so cool, so damnably self-possessed.\n\n\"Froken Hagen,\" Campbell ventured, \"aren't you sick of all this? Captain\nLincoln says you have been here for five years. Aren't you dead tired of\nit?\"\n\n\"No.\" Her voice was a strong soprano timbre.\n\n\"Don't you want to get back to the North again?\"\n\n\"Often.\" She had a quiet aloof smile. Somewhere was the impression of a\ngentlewoman. She did not mean to be abrupt. She was just immensely\nself-possessed.\n\nIt occurred to Shane suddenly that he liked this woman. He liked her\ndignity, her grave composure. He liked her coolness, her almost Viennese\ngrace. He liked her features; but for the wideness of her mouth, and the\nlittle prominence of chin, she would have been immensely beautiful. Her\ncorn-like hair, massively braided, must be like a mane when down, and\nbeneath her Paris frock he could sense her deep bosom, great marble\nlimbs. Her voice had the cool sweet beauty of Northern winds.... Her\neyes were steady, her chin uptilted. Somewhere, some time, somehow she\nhad mastered fate.\n\nAbout, in the gas-lit square, escorted, guarded, went other women,\nreputable women. Great rawboned women, daughters of Irish _portenos_,\nwith the coarseness of the Irish peasant in their faces, the brogue of\nthe Irish peasant on their Spanish, but punctiliously Castilian as to\nmanners; gross Teutonic women; fluffy sentimental Englishwomen, bearing\nexile bravely, but thinking long for the Surrey downs; gravid Italian\nwomen, clumsy in the body, sweet and wistful in the face; Argentines,\nclouded with powder, liquid of eyes, on their lips a soft little down\nthat would in a few years be an abomination unto the Lord; women of\nmixed breed, with the kink of Africa in their hair, or the golden tint\nof the Indian in their skin. Good women! And yet.... For grace, for\ncoolness, for cleanliness, the venal Swedish girl outshone them all....\n\n\"Froken Hagen,\" Campbell said, \"may I call on you some time?\"\n\n\"If you like.\"\n\n\"Does that mean you don't want me to come?\"\n\nShe smiled at him.\n\n\"Mr. Campbell,\" she laughed gently, \"you know very well what I am. If\nyou don't call on me it won't mean anything to me. If you do call I\nthink I'll be rather glad. Because on first appearances I like you. But\ndo whatever you like. I have no wiles.\"\n\n\"Thank God for that!\"\n\nLincoln, master of the _Katurah Knopp_, listened in with a silent\nchuckle. She was a queer one, Hedda was. And Campbell, he was a queer\none, too. Two queer ones together. Hedda was all right, but a man\nsickened of her quick. She wasn't what you might call warm. No\naffection; that's what a man missed far from home, affection. Yes,\naffection. Hedda had none. She was a fine woman, but she had no\naffection. He liked to see men get stung. In a few days Campbell would\nbe down at the club with a face as long as to-day and to-morrow. He\nwould call for a drink angrily.\n\n\"Well, captain, what's got into you? You don't look happy.\"\n\nAnd Campbell, like the others, would grumble something about a\nGod-damned big Swede.\n\n\"Hey, what's wrong? Ain't Hedda treated you right?\"\n\n\"Sure, she treated me right,\" he would say as the others said, \"but God\ndamn! that woman's not human. Take away that rot-gut and gi' me whisky.\nI got a touch o' chill.\"\n\nLincoln had seen it all before. He liked to see it all the time. He\nchuckled as Shane turned to him.\n\n\"Lincoln, are you seeing this lady home?\"\n\n\"Not if you want to.\"\n\n\"I don't want to break up any arrangements of yours.\"\n\n\"Tell the truth,\" Lincoln said, \"I've got a little party to-night. A\nparty as is a party--Spanish girls, Spanish dancers ... I wish I could\ntake you, but it ain't my party....\"\n\n\"Then I'll see Miss Hagen home.\"\n\nDog-gone, Lincoln would have to go down to the club and tell 'em how\nCampbell of the _Maid of the Isles_ got stuck with the human iceberg!\n\n\nSection 5\n\nWithout, the west wind had increased suddenly, a cold steady wind,\ncoasting down the Argentine pampas, bending the sparse trees and giant\nthistle, ruffling the river, shallowing it, until to-morrow many a poor\nsailorman would regret his optimistic anchorage ... Shane shivered....\nTo-morrow October would be making a din in the streets.... And the poor\nskippers fighting their way round the Horn, icy winds and head seas and\nimmense gray dirty-bearded waves.... To-morrow three men were to be shot\nin the 25 de Mayo for a political offense, and Shane could see them in\nthe bleak dawn, three frightened stanch figures; the soldiers would be\nblowing their fingers in the cold air, and their triggers would be like\nice to the touch ... the shoddy tragedy....\n\nBut within the room was warm, a little fire of coal in the unusual\ngrate, and the soft and mellow lights of candles, and here and there\ngauchos' blankets on the wall, and here a comfortable chair and there a\ntable of line, and brass things ... clean and ascetic, and yet\nsomething womanly about the place, the grace and composition of\nthings.... And with her coming into her house, Hedda Hagen's manner had\nchanged gently.... She was no longer frigid, aloof.... She unbent into\ncalm smiles, and the grace of a hostess of the big world ... the quiet\nmasonic signal of a certain caste....\n\n\"I wonder,\" he said; \"am I dreaming?\"\n\nShe paused suddenly. She had taken her hat off, and was touching things\non the tables with her large fine hands. She turned her head toward him.\nThere was a half smile in her eyes.\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"It doesn't seem right.\"\n\n\"That you never saw me before, that you are here in this house after\nmeeting me half an hour ago, and that you can stay here the night?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Well, it's true.\"\n\nShe was once more the hostess. It was as if some one had sprung nimbly\nfrom a little height to the ground.\n\n\"I can't give you any whisky. But I can make you tea. Or have my maid\nbrew you some coffee.\"\n\n\"Is that a Russian samovar?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Then I'll have tea.\"\n\nSo queer! Without the wind blustered and the little din of it crept into\nthe room somehow, and within was warmth, and the stillness of still\ntrees. And grace. Beauty moved like an actress on the stage. All her\nmotions were harmonious, could have gone to some music on the violin.\nNow it was the easy dropping to her knees as she lit the quaint Russian\nteapot, now an unconscious movement of her hand to push back a braid of\nher hair, now the firm certain motion of her strong white unringed\nfingers. Now her large graceful body moved like some heroic statue that\nhad become quick with life. The thought came into his head, somehow,\nthat if he had had a sister he would have liked her to have been like\nthis splendid blond woman....\n\nYet into this house, where she had settled like some strange bird in an\nalien land, came ships' masters, reeking with drink, came merchants with\ntheir minds full of buying and selling and all the petty meannesses of\ntrade, came dark Latins who hankered for blond women....\n\n\"God! I can't understand.\"\n\nShe came toward him frankly....\n\n\"_Amigo mio_, have you a right to understand?\"\n\n\"I'm sorry.\"\n\n\"No, but--see! You and I have often met. I mean: there is a plane of us,\nwho must be loyal to one another. You understand. And to you, to one of\nus, I don't want to lie. Only certain persons have a right to ask. A\nfather, a mother, a child, a sister or brother or husband. But our\ndestinies touch only, hardly even that. Will never grip, bind. There is\nno right you have, beyond what--you buy; and there are things--I don't\nsell.\"\n\n\"I'm sorry,\" Shane turned aside. \"I was just carried away. But I should\ngo.\"\n\n\"Do you want to go?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Then stay. Others stay.\"\n\n\"But--\"\n\n\"Are you better than the others? Think.\"\n\n\"No,\" he thought. \"Of course not. Worse perhaps. I know better.\"\n\n\"You are nearly as honest as I am,\" she laughed. She put her hand out in\na great frank gesture.\n\n\"If I can smile, surely you can.\" Her fingers beckoned. \"Come, don't be\nsilly.\"\n\nHe caught her hands and laughed with her. He had been acting like a boy\nin his twenties, and he a man of forty-two....\n\n\nSection 6\n\nHe had thought somehow that in this affair of Hedda he would find--oh,\nsomething: that once more the moon would take on its rippling smile and\nthe sun its sweet low laughter, and the winds be no longer a matter of\nphysics, but strong entities. Quickly, unconsciously, the thought had\ncome to him.... With the wife of his young days had come the magic of\nromance, and with Claire-Anne of Marseilles had come a sublime storm of\npassion, and with the Arab lady had come the scheme of an ordered life,\ngood composition and rich color.... They had lasted but little and gone\nas a rainbow goes.... With Hedda there was nothing.... It was just\nabominably wrong....\n\nHere he was, young--for his forty-two he was young,--supple, successful\nin his way, rich if you wanted to put it in that word. And no heart for\nlife; listless. It was wrong.... All he could think of doing was to be\nintimate with an easy woman. No zest for her great noble frame, her\nsurge of flaxen hair. The veneer of conventional good manners,\nconventional good taste, only made the actuality of it more appalling\n... she with the gifts of life and grace, he with his, and all they\ncould do was be physically intimate.... And she took money with a little\nsmile, contemptuous of herself, contemptuous of him.... They both knew\nbetter, yet there you were ... God! Even animals had the excuse of\nnature's indomitable will!\n\nYes, this made him face things he had been trying to pass casually by.\nForty-two, a touch of gray at the temples, a body like a boy's, hooded\neyes like a hawk's, and a feeling in him somehow that an organ--his\nheart maybe--was dead: not ailing--just unalive. Once he had zest, and\nhe didn't even have despair now. If he could only have despair....\n\nDespair was healthy. It meant revolt. A man might sob, gnash his teeth,\nbatter walls with his bare fists, but that only meant he was alive in\nevery fiber. He might curse the stars, but he was aware of their\nbrilliance. He might curse the earth that would one day take his\nlifeless body, but he must know its immense fecundity. A man in revolt,\nin despair, was a healthy man.\n\nBut despair was so futile. Ah, there it was! Life's futility. It was the\nsense of that which had eaten him like a vile leprosy. Mental futility,\nspiritual futility. Of physical he did not know. All that was left him\nof his youth was a belief in God. At sea he was too close to the immense\nmechanism of the stars, on land too close to milling millions, not to\nbelieve, not to accept him as an incontrovertible fact.\n\nBut the God of degenerate peoples, the antagonistic, furious, implacable\nGod--that was a ridiculous conception. A cheap, a vain one. \"As flies to\nwanton boys, are we to the gods.\" Wasn't that how Shakspere's blind king\nhad uttered it? \"They kill us for their sport.\" How strangely\nflattering--to believe that the Immensity that had conceived and wrought\nthe unbelievable universe should deign to consider man, so weak that a\nstone, a little slug of lead, could kill him, an enemy worth bothering\nabout. Man with his vanity, his broad fallibility, his poor natural\nfunctions!\n\nAnd as to the God of the optimists, how ridiculous, too. \"The Lord is my\nshepherd, I shall not want.\" So pathetic! They never saw that they did\nwant. That for every well-filled body, there were a hundred haggard men.\nThey thought of him as benevolent, firm but benevolent, like Mr.\nGladstone. To them he was an infinitely superior vestryman with a\ntremendous power for dispensing coal and food to the poor. And the poor\ndevils were so patient, so loyal. And so stupid; they thought that much\nflattery, much fear, would move Him. Their conception never even rose to\nconsidering God as a gentleman, despising flattery and loathing fear.\nPoor, poor devils!\n\nTo Shane He existed, though how to think of Him was difficult. Why a\nman? Why not some strange thing of the air, as a cuttlefish is of the\nsea? Something tenuous, of immense brain power, of immense will.\nSomething cold. But why even that? Why not, as the cabalists had it, a\nFigure, arithmetical or geometrical, a Sound.... A Formula of some great\nundiscoverable indefinable Thought.... He was cold, He was efficient. He\nhad so much brains....\n\nIt seemed to Shane that this optimism, this despair were strange mental\ndrugs, going through the mental system as a depressant or a stimulant\nwould go through the physical, creating illusions ... illusions ... and\nthe sane man was one who had no illusions, not the meaning a man uses of\nthe phrase when he has been jilted by a woman or wronged out of money by\na friend, but actually, finitely, no illusions.... He was sane, a few\nother men in the world must be sane, but the rest were drugged for their\nhell or their Fiddlers' Green....\n\nFiddlers' Green! Good God! Fiddlers' Green!\n\nHis mind flashed back a moment to the shining isle, the green sward, the\nsinging waves, the sunlight on the green jalousies, but strangely his\nmind could see nothing. He could no longer make a picture for himself.\nSymbols were barren algebraic formulae. Not enchanters' words. No light.\nNo glamour. Only strange sounds reverberating in the gray caverns of his\nhead.... Once in the dead past he could see the Isle of Pipers--no more!\nIt wasn't his past that was dead. The past lived. It was he was dead,\nhe, his present, his future.\n\nOut of the gray caverns of his head came a thin echo of a word he had\nknown and he a boy. The Valley of the Black Pig. A phrase from some old\nfolk-tale heard on a wintry Antrim coast. Some prophecy of old wives\nthat when the Boar without Bristles would appear in the Valley of the\nBlack Pig, then the end of all things was nigh.... He had a faint memory\nthat somewhere in Roscommon was the Valley of the Black Pig.... But that\ndidn't matter; what mattered was the memory it evoked.... Gray, gray,\ngray.... Gray hills, gray boulders, gray barren trees, a gray mist\nsluggishly rising from the ground, and a gray drizzle of rain, falling,\nso slowly.... And gray rotting leaves beneath his feet.... A little wind\nthat moaned among the boulders, and the cawing of unseen, horrible\nbirds.... Neither was there direction, nor time, nor space....\nEverything gray like the grayness of old women's bodies.... There was no\nsun, and the moon abhorred the valley. In such a place as this wandered\nthe souls of women who had killed their children, of monks who at dark\nof night had said the Black Mass.... Here were masters who had deserted\ntall, gallant ships.... Hither witches rode on the bleak east wind, to\nbe flogged by their masters and horribly caressed.... The Valley of the\nBlack Pig.... Here were those who had read the frightful inscription on\nthe altar of the Unknown God ... Gilles de Rais, marshal of France, and\nAvicenna; Nicolas Flamel and his wife Petronella; Lady Alice Kyteler of\nKilkenny, and Gerald of Desmond, the Great Earl; and newer names, Dee\nand Edward Kelly.... Degraded majesty with soiled beards.... Gray,\ngray.... And the faint ghosts in cerecloths, and the horrible shapes of\nthe mist.... The drizzle of the rain, and the rustle of the Feet of the\nGoat.... The cawing of strange birds and the wind among the boulders\nand souls, weeping, weeping--unhoping, undespairing, weeping,\nweeping.... The Valley of the Black Pig....\n\nWhat was it? In God's name what was it that had made him this way, his\nbeing suddenly lifeless, like a cow that goes dry, or a field that is\nmysteriously, suddenly fallow.... And weariness seemed immortal.... What\nhad led him into this dreadful cemetery of the mind? Had he gone too far\nin thought and emotion and come to a dreadful desert plane within\nhimself ...? Had he eaten of the tree of which the cabalist wrote:\n\n  Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat;\n  But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou\n    shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou eatest\n    thereof thou shalt surely die.\n\nHad he blundered on it unwittingly, eaten ignorantly and surely died?...\nOr was he going mad? Good God! Could that be it? Was there something\nthey hadn't told him--a strange taint in his blood, or his mother's\nblood.... Would he end his days in a madhouse.... What a fate, what a\ndreadful fate! A slavering gray-headed man, wandering through the\nValley of the Black Pig, forever and forever?\n\nBetter to end it now.\n\nYes, but would that end it? The material envelope of cells and fluids\ngone, might there not ...? Christ! Worse off yet, if anything were\nleft.... There might be something left; there was the trouble.... One\nknew so little, so abominably little.... Only material wisdom was\ncertain, and that said: Don't chance it....\n\nDrink? He had his men to think of, his ship.... It might grip him.\n\nBut was he forever doomed to this mournful weeping place, place of rain,\nplace of mists, gray boulders, and moaning winds? Must he abide in the\nValley of the Black Pig until the Boar without Bristles came lumbering\nout of the red west, and went grunting, eating ravenously, eating prey\nof souls, until he lay down in obscene sleep, and the stars one by one\nguttered like candles, and the sun shot into a vast explosion, and the\nmoon was a handful of peat ashes, and the whole great universe snapped\nlike a gunshot and the debris of all created things fell downward like a\nshattered wall, faster, faster, faster, to where, where, where?\n\n\nSection 7\n\nIn the streets now the June snow fell, not the soft and flaky petals of\nthe North, but a bitter steel-like snow, that whirled. And the winds of\nthe pampas hurried like Furies through the sordid streets, and stopped\nto snarl, as a dog snarls, and now moaned, and now howled sharply, as a\nwolf howls. There was something cold, malignant, about it all ... Old\nIrish writers said that hell was cold. _An Ait Fuar_, they called it,\nthe Cold Place. _Ait gan chu gan chat, gan leanbh, ait gan ghean, gan\nghaire_, a place without a dog, or cat, or child, a place without\naffection or laughter.... Had sainted Brendan come on Buenos Aires in\nwinter on his voyage to Hy Brazil, and thought in his naivete that here\nwas hell ...? And was he wrong?\n\nCold of wolves! It must have been like this in ancient Paris when Villon\nthieved and sang, and the wolves came clamoring at the gates ... and the\ncrusaders in warm Palestine.... Or in Russia--Siberia, a cold name....\nHere it was hell, but in Europe ... oh, different there! The heavy\nflakes, so solid, so wonderful, the laden trees, the great stretch of\nwhite. And in the houses the farmers blessing the snow, that would keep\nthe ground warm and fertile for the coming year, that the blue flax\nmight arise, and the fields of corn, with the great pleasance of the\nclover, and the golden-belted bees.... And the turf fires of Ulster, and\nChristmas coming, and after that Candlemas, and then March of the\nplowing, and glossy crows busy in the fields.... Always something to see\nahead.... Not in Ireland only, but England, the jingle of bells and the\npeople of ruddy faces.... And in Germany, too, the bluff important\nburghers having their houses heated by quaint porcelain stoves, huddling\nthemselves in furs, and waddling obesely.... Very pleasant.... And in\nFrance, too, in the _assommoirs_, the tang of wine in the air and the\nblue hue of smoke, excited Latin voices. \"_Encore un bock! T'es saoul,\nmon vieux! Flute! Je suis comme le Pont Neuf!_\" A raucous voice singing\na political skit:\n\n  Cordieu, Madame! Que faites-vous ici?\n  Cordieu, Madame! Que faites-vous ici?\n  Je danse le polka avec tous mes amis!\n  Je danse le polka avec tous mes amis!\n\nBuenos Aires, hell!\n\nAnd the worst was the strange inversion of time. Here winter was, cold\nstreets, steely snow, garbage frozen to stone.... And in Europe was sane\nJune. Purple flower of the heather in Ulster, and white flower of the\nbogs, and in the little bays of Antrim, men spearing flounders from\nboats in the long summer evenings. And the bairns hame from school, with\na' their wee games, fishing for sticky-backs wi' pins, and the cummers\nspinning. Eigh, Ulster! And in England, they punting on the Thames,\namong the water-lilies. Soft Norman days, and in Germany the young folks\ngoing to the woods.... In Buenos Aires, hell!\n\nWithin the house a cold that the little fire could only gallantly fight\nagainst. Without, cold of wolves.\n\n\"Hedda, you come from a cold country. Tell me, is it like this in\nSweden, any time?\"\n\nShe was sitting in the candle-light, doing the needlework she took such\nquietness in. Her firm white hands moving rhythmically, her body steady,\nher eyes a-dream. It was hard ever to think that she was--what she was.\nIt was hard for him to think the word now, knowing her. She looked up\nand smiled.\n\n\"No, Shane, not like this. It's cold, very cold. But very beautiful. By\nday the country-side is quiet, white, ascetic, like some young nun. And\nat night there are lights and jollity. It is like a child's idea of\nfairy-land. One wishes one were further north, where the reindeer are.\nOne is not enemy to the cold, as you are here. One accepts it. It has\ndignity. Here it is naked, malevolent. That's the difference.\"\n\n\"Naked, with awful hands.... A cold that seizes....\"\n\n\"Yes, Shane.\" She took up her work again. \"Sometimes I think long until\nI get back to Sweden.\"\n\n\"You--you are going back?\"\n\n\"Of course, Shane.\"\n\n\"When?\"\n\n\"Five, six, seven years, unless I die, or am killed. Certainly I shall\ngo back.\"\n\n\"Yes, but in five, six--hum!\"\n\n\"But what, Shane?\"\n\n\"I once knew a woman, Hedda. She was--as you are. Just having friends.\nAnd she was as handsome as you are, too. She didn't have your head, your\npoise. She liked beauty, as you do. But this woman looked forward, as I\ndon't think you do. She saw herself always going down. She saw herself\nin the end like the helmet-maker's daughter, in some archway of the\ncity, seeking a couple of pence.... And she was afraid, horribly\nafraid....\"\n\n\"She was a silly woman.\"\n\n\"How, Hedda?\"\n\n\"She didn't know two things. That luck changes; destiny is sometimes as\nkind as it is cruel. And also, when you are old, the money of the\narchway will bring you as much joy, a drink, a bed, a meal for the\nmorrow, as do the diamonds of youth. The old don't need much, Shane.\nThey haven't far to go.\"\n\n\"But you, Hedda. Aren't you afraid of--the archway, and the few pence--\"\n\n\"No, Shane. That will not be my way.\" The broidery dropped to her lap.\nHer eyes, blue as winter, looked away, away. \"I shall survive it all,\nbarring death of course, and in seven, eight, ten years, I shall drop\nall this and go back, and be a lady in the land of my birth, a quiet,\nsoft-voiced woman in a little house that has glinting brass in winter\nand flowers around it in summer. And I shall be very kind to the poor,\nShane.... And all young things that are baffled or hurt can come to me,\nand tell their troubles, and I shall understand. And oftentimes, sitting\nin the long Northern twilights, I shall think: Is this Froken Hagen, who\nis all the world's friend, the girl who was once despised in Buenos\nAires?... And I shall choke a little, and think: 'God is good!'\"\n\n\"You are very sure of yourself, Hedda.\"\n\n\"Yes, Shane. I know my own capabilities. I know, too, my own\nlimitations. I know I can always be of service. But I know, too, that\nthere will be no love ever for me, nor any little children of my body,\nnor any big man to protect me and my house ...\"\n\n\"This other woman--I killed her to save her from the archway--she\ndreaded so much ...\"\n\n\"You were very silly, Shane,\" she snipped off a thread with the\nscissors. \"People outgrow fear, and it may only have been a passing\nmood, that would have gone with the moon or the season. You know very\nlittle about women, Shane.\"\n\nHe laughed bitterly. \"I have been married twice, and once I loved a\nwoman greatly.\"\n\n\"From what you tell me,\" her voice was calm, \"you have never been\nmarried. You made a mistake as a boy. And once again you bought a woman,\nas you might a fine dog, admired her, as you might admire a fine dog,\nand gave her a little passion, which comes and goes, knocks, passes\non--but no trust. And once you were infatuated with a hysterical woman,\nand it all ended hysterically. No, Shane. I don't think you know much\nabout women.\"\n\n\"You know so many things.\" He was irritated. \"Perhaps you know what is\nwrong with me.\"\n\n\"Of course I do, Shane. Anybody would know. You are so important to\nyourself. All the world is in relation to you, not you in relation to\nthe world. And people are not very important, Shane ... I know.... You\nlook for things. You don't make them. You want everything. You give\nnothing. You haven't a wife, a house. Your father gave poems. But you\nhaven't a house, a child, a wife, a book. You only have a trading-ship.\"\n\n\"But I trade. I do my share of the world's work.\"\n\n\"Any shop-keeper!\"\n\n\"I handle my ship.\"\n\n\"Any mathematician....\"\n\n\"I brave all the perils of the sea.\"\n\n\"Are you afraid of death?\"\n\n\"Of course not.\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"Hedda, I handle men.\"\n\n\"Any little braggadocio lieutenant....\"\n\nHis anger rose in hot waves. \"So I am not worth anything in life, Hedda.\nHow much are you?\"\n\n\"O, Shane,\" she stood up and looked at him seriously, \"my calling is the\noldest in the world, they say, but to me it's not the least honorable.\nIt is sordid or not just as one makes it. I want you to think of men\ngoing to sea, and weary of the voyage, and from me somehow they get a\nglimpse of home. Are this house and myself more evil than the dram-shop\nand the gambling-hell? And aren't there women in England and France who\nwould rather have their menfolk with me than leaning on some sodden\ncounter? They might hate the choice, but it's better.... Shane, if you\nknew how weary men have talked to me of families abroad, their hearts\nburdened. They cannot talk to men ... and sometimes I exorcise devils,\nShane, that young girls may walk safely in the dark.... And sometimes a\nman is athirst for a flash of beauty.... Think, Shane--you are not\nsmall.... Even yourself, Shane, I have helped you. There were times this\nmonth when you were close to the river, terribly, terribly close.... I\nsaid nothing, but I knew. And I held you. I willed. I prayed even ...\nShane, Shane, _amigo_, when the time came that I had to work I chose\nthis with my eyes open.\"\n\n\"I'm sorry,\" Campbell lowered his head. \"I can only say I'm sorry I\nsaid--hinted.... But Hedda, weren't there other things you could have\ndone?\"\n\n\"A sempstress, maybe. But I think it's more important to ease a man's\nmind than to cover his back.\"\n\n\"But children. You love children, Hedda. You know so much. Couldn't you\nhave been a governess in some great house?\"\n\n\"O Shane, Shane _mio_, when will you understand?\" Her calm voice had a\nnote of distress in it. \"None can judge of another's life. None can\ntell. None direct. What do you know of what passed before--I came to a\nmean house in a mean town? I once opened a door I shouldn't have, and\nleft the lighted room ... for a warm blue darkness.... And I closed the\ndoor behind me.... And daylight came. I am not of a breed that sues for\nmercy. So I went ahead ... through the world. And I never look back,\nShane. I am no Lot's wife, to become a pillar of her own salt tears....\"\n\n\"But Hedda, you are good. And this life--\"\n\n\"Of course I am good, Shane. There is no man can say I did him wrong in\nmind or body, or heart, either. And I am a comfort to many.... All I\nhave done is to outrage a convention of property that I don't believe\n... Shane, do you know people cover greed with sentimentality and call\nit virtue?\"\n\n\"But, Hedda, the women don't see. They scorn you--\"\n\n\"Do they? Poor souls. Let them! _Amigo mio_, I have a life. I have to\nthink, gage, act, concentrate. And when I want time of my own, Shane, I\nhave it. The housewife with her frowsy duties, being kissed\nperfunctorily on the mat, the man who wears a stilted mask to the world,\nand before her--lets go.... Ugh! And the _mondaine_ with her boredom ...\nthe hatred in wide houses.... Oh, I know. Sometimes I think it's so\nwonderful, being free....\n\n\"O Shane, please don't be absurd, sentimental ... please, I know my way,\nand find yours.... Tell me, do you know yet what day you sail?\"\n\n\nSection 8\n\nA sailor in a jersey and reefer caught his arm in the Avenida de\nMayo....\n\n\"All filled up.\" Campbell uttered brusquely.\n\n\"It was no' that.\"\n\nCampbell put his hand in his pocket looking for a coin.\n\n\"You'll be forgetting the Antrim glens, Shane Campbell.\" Shane flushed.\nThe coin in his fingers burned him.\n\n\"How did I know you were fro' the Antrim glens?\"\n\n\"You've seen me a few times, though you'd hardly know me. Simon Fraser\nof Ballycastle. You would no' recognize me, if you knew me, on account\nof my hair being white. I was lost on the coast of Borneo for four\nyears. When I was lost my hair was black--maybe a wee sprinkle o'\ngray--but what you might call black; and when I was picked up, and saw\nmyself in a looking-glass, it was white. They did no' know me when I got\nback to Ballycastle.\"\n\n\"Would you care for a drink, Simon?\"\n\n\"I don't care much either way, Shane Campbell. And if I wanted a drink\nbad, I always have the silver for 't. I would no' have you think I\nstopped you for to cadge a drink. I'm no' that kind of man. But I was\nwi' your uncle Alan when he died. Or to be exact, I saw him just before\nhe died. I was visiting in Cushendun. I have a half-brither there you\nmight know, Tamas McNeil, Red Tam they ca' him. And whiles I was there,\nI saw Alan Donn go down.\"\n\n\"My uncle Alan dead! Why, man, you're crazy--\"\n\n\"Your uncle Alan's a dead man.\"\n\n\"You're mistaken, man. It's some one else.\"\n\n\"Your uncle Alan's a dead man. And what's more: I have a word from him\nfor ye.\"\n\n\"But I'd have heard.\"\n\n\"I cam' out in steam. It went against the grain a bit, but I cam' out in\nsteam. From Belfast.... With a new boat out of Queen's Island ... Alan\nDonn's a dead man. That's why I stopped you. For to tell you your uncle\nAlan's gone....\"\n\n\"Come in, here,\" Shane said dazedly. He pulled the man into a bar, and\nsat down in a snug. \"Tell me.\"\n\n\"It was about nine in the morning, and an awful gray day it was, wi' a\nheavy sea running and a nor'easter, and this schooner was getting the\ntimbers pounded out o' her. Her upper gear was gone entirely, and we\ncould no' see how she was below, on account of the high seaway. She was\na Frenchman, or a Portuguese. And she was gone. And we were all on\nshore, wondering why she had no' put into Greenock or Stranraer, or what\nkind of sailors they were at all, at all.\n\n\"Up comes your uncle Alan; and he says: 'Has anybody put out to give\nthose poor bastards a hand?' says he.\n\n\"'There's no chance, Alan Donn,' says we.\n\n\"And he says: 'How the hell do you know?' says he.\n\n\"And we say: 'Can't you see for youself, Alan Donn, wi' the sea that's\nin it, and the wind that's in it, and the currents, there's no chance to\nhelp them?'\n\n\"'So you're not going,' says he.\n\n\"'Och, Alan Donn, have sense,' says we.\n\n\"'If you aren't, then by Jesus, I am.'\n\n\"He turns to one of the men there, a fisherman by the name of Rafferty,\nand he says: 'Hughie, get ready that wee boat o' yours, wi' the spitfire\nforesail, and the wee trisail.'\n\n\"Then we said: 'You're not going, Alan Donn.'\n\n\"'Who's to stop me?' says he. All this time we had to shout on account\nof the great wind was in it.\n\n\"'We think too much of you, Alan Donn, to let you go.'\n\n\"'If one o' you stinking badgers lays a finger on me to stop me, I'll\nbreak his God-damned neck.'\n\n\"Says Hughie Rafferty to us--you know Hughie Rafferty, a silent man, a\nwise man--says he: 'He'll get out fifty yards, a hundred yards from\nshore and be stuck. And he'll say: \"Well, I've done my best. Good-by and\nto hell with ye, and die like men!\" And he'll come back. And if the boat\nturns over,' says Hughie Rafferty, 'he can swim like a rat, and he'll\nbe back among us cursing, like his ain kind sel', within a wheen o'\nminutes.'\n\n\"Says Hughie Rafferty, says he: 'I'll go wi' your Honor's Lordship, Alan\nDonn.'\n\n\"'You will like hell,' says Alan Donn. 'You'll stay here wi' your\nchilder and the mother o' your childer.'\n\n\"Then a wee old man, that was a piper, speaks up. He was bent in two\nover an ash plant was in his right hand, and his left hand held his\nback.\n\n\"'It's a foolish thing you are doing, Alan Donn,' says he. 'How can you\nbring off the poor people?'\n\n\"'I don't want to bring off the poor people, Shamus-a-Feeba, James of\nthe Pipes. But there's not a rock, a wind, a current, a wave itself of\nStruth na-Maoile that I don't know. I'm figuring on rigging up some kind\nof sea-anchor,' says Alan Donn, says he, 'and getting the ignorant\nforeigners to chop their gear overboard, and riding the storm out. Don't\nworry yourself, Shamus-a-Feeba.'\n\n\"That was the way of your uncle, Alan Donn Campbell. He was very rough\nwith the strong, but he was ay considerate of the old and over-young.\nHe'd be rough with the king of England but he'd be awfu' polite to an\nould man.\"\n\n\"God, is Alan Donn dead?\" Shane was near tears. \"Do people like Alan\nDonn die?\"\n\n\"Aye, they die, too,\" said Simon Fraser. \"And rogues live. It's queer.\n\n\"The boat was a'ready to be put into the sea, when your uncle sees\nmysel' on the edge o' the gathering. He comes straight to me. You mind\nhow Alan Donn used to go through a crowd.\n\n\"'Are you the sailing man,' says he, 'wha's a half-brither to Red Tam\nMcNeil of the Ten-Acre?'\"\n\n\"'I am, sir, Alan Donn.'\n\n\"'Is it go wi' ye in the boat?' says I. 'I'll go.'\n\n\"'No, no,' quo' he. 'It's no' that. So'thin' different. You ken my\nbrither's son, Shane Oge Campbell, wha's a master on the seas?'\n\n\"'I've met him once or twice, and I've heard tell.'\n\n\"'If you see him, gi'e him a message. I'm sure you'll see him. I'm\nsure,' says Alan Donn, 'this morn I'm fey.'\n\n\"'Tell him,' says Alan Donn, and he puts his hand on my shoulder. 'Tell\nhim this: I've been intending to write him this long time. There's a\nthought in my head,' says he, 'that all's not well with him.\n\n\"'Tell him this: I've been thinking and I've thought: There's great\nvirtue to the place you're born in. Tell him he ought no' stay so long\nfrae the braes o' Ulster. Tell him: The sea's not good for the head. A\nman's alone wi' himself too long, wi' his ain heid. Tell him that's not\ngood.\n\n\"'Tell him,' says he, 'there's great virtue and grand soothin' to the\nyellow whins and the purple heather. That's a deep fey thing. Tell him\nto try.'\n\n\"'Is that all, sir, Alan Donn,' says I?\n\n\"'You might tell him,' says he, 'aye, you might tell him: \"'Your uncle\nAlan was not a coward, and he was a wise man.\"'\n\n\"At that I was puzzled--I tell you without, offense meant--it sounded\nlike boasting. And it was no' like Alan Donn to boast.\n\n\"'Can I come along wi' you, sir, Alan Donn?' says I.\n\n\"With that he gies me a look would knock you down. 'Did na I tell you to\ndo so'thin' for me?' says he.\n\n\"Then I kent he was na coming back.\n\n\"'Aye, aye, sir,' said I.\n\n\"He goes to the boat on the edge of the water. You could hardly keep\nyour footing with the wind, nor hear your neighbor with the sea. And\nAlan Donn laughs: 'By Christ, 't is myself that must be fond o'\nboating,' says he. 'And to-day is the grand day for it, surely. _Hi\nhoro_, push her off,' says he. '_Horo eile! Horo_, heroes, _horo eile!_'\nWe pushed with the water up to our waists. The keel ground. The sand\nsucked. We pushed with the water up to our shoulders. Then the trisail\ncaught the wind. And Alan Donn was off.\n\n\"And Hughie Rafferty was wrong: Not at fifty, not at a hundred did he\nturn. Not at half a mile. He must have had the arms of Finn McCool, Alan\nDonn, and the hands of a woman. He'd take the high waves like a hunter\ntaking a wall. Then you could nearly feel him easing her to the pitch.\nApart from the waves themselves you could see the wee fountain of water\nwhen the bows slapped. Then he'd come up again. The trisail would belly\nand again he'd dive.\n\n\"And then he came to the ninth wave--_tonn a' bhaidhte_, the drowning\nwave. Even away off you could see it rise like a wall, and curl at the\ntop. We were watching. There was the crippled schooner, and Alan Donn,\nand the great sea. And the wave curled and broke. And then was only the\nschooner and the great sea....\n\n\"And we waited for a minute, although we knew there was no call.\n\n\"And after a while an ould one falls to her knees and raises the keening\ncry:\n\n\"'_Mavrone!_ my sorrow! _Mavrone dhu!_ my black sorrow! _Mo chead vrone\ndhu! my_ hundred black sorrows.\n\n\"'Is it gone you are, Alan Donn? Is it gone you are in the cruel sea? My\nblack curse on it. It is between you and the people of your heart,\nbetween you and the land of your desire. Och, sea, isn't it cruel you\nare? Ruined Ireland is this day. The star of Ulster is out. And the\nlittle moon of Antrim shines no more. Och, _a 'airrge!_ My sorrow, O\nsea!\n\n\"'Who will be good to us, now, Alan Donn? You were good to the poor.\nGod's gain and our loss. Who will make the young maids flush, and the\nyoung men throw back their shoulders, from pride at your having talked\nto them? _Avourneen dherelish, mur nAlan Donn_, our Alan! Who will make\nthe men of the South stand back, and you not striding through a\ngathering, ever, any more? And the dealing men of Scotland will miss\nyou, you they could never get the better of in any fair, night noon or\nmorning. _Peader agas Pol, Muire. Padraig agas Brighid!_ Peter and Paul,\nMary, Patrick and St. Bride, let you be coming quickly now, and take up\nAlan Donn Campbell from the cold sea!\n\n\"'Your horse in the stable will miss you, Alan Donn. Poor beastie, he'll\nmiss you sore. Your servant boys will miss you, they that would jump if\nyou but dropped your pipe. The green fairways of Portrush will miss you\nwhen spring comes, and you not hitting the ball against the champions of\nthe world. The lambs will miss you, wee lambs of the fields, and the\ncolts. They'll be missing you, but't will be nothing to our missing you.\nThis night your dogs will be crying, and we'll be crying too.\n\n\"'Young woman look back of you, and see if the nine glens of Antrim are\nthere. I wouldn't be surprised if they were gone, now Alan Donn's in the\nbitter sea.'\n\n\"Then up comes this woman, and she had a great cloak on--\"\n\n\"What woman, Simon Fraser?\"\n\n\"The woman there was talk of Alan Donn marrying. The woman from over the\nsea.\"\n\n\"'Has anybody seen Mr. Campbell?' And we don't understand.\n\n\"It's Alan Donn she means,' says Hughie Rafferty.\n\n\"Then the ould one on her knees takes up her keening. And this woman\nunderstands. Her face goes white. She sees the schooner being battered\nby the Moyle.\n\n\"'Did he go out to that?' she asks.\n\n\"'Yes, ma'am, your Ladyship's Honor.'\n\n\"'He didn't get there?'\n\n\"'The drowning wave caught Alan Donn,' says Hughie Rafferty.\n\n\"For a moment you'd think she hadn't heard. Then--a strange thing--a wee\nsmile came on her face, and suddenly it changed to a queer twist, all\nover the face of her. Then she stood up proudly and looked out to sea\n... and two tears came to the eyes of her and she raised her head higher\nstill.... The tears came in spite of her ... and suddenly she gave a wee\ngulp like a person who's sick.... And she turned and began to stumble\naway in the sand.... A couple of the young ones went as if to help her,\nbut she turned.\n\n\"'Please,' was all she said. And she went off on her lee lone.\n\n\"And then says Hughie Rafferty: 'The tide will bring him to Cushendall.'\n\n\"And at Cushendall next day we found the corp. There wasn't a mark on\nhim. Even the things of the deep water had respect for Alan Doon.\"\n\n\"What was this woman like, Simon Fraser? This woman there was talk of\nAlan Donn marrying?\"\n\n\"This woman was not a woman of Alan Donn's age. An' she was not a young\nwoman. Her face was showing not the face of a girl but the face of\nherself. She had a proud face and a brave face. This woman would be\naround twenty-five.\n\n\"She was a brown woman: she had brown eyes and brown hair. She was not\nan Irishwoman. She was an Englishwoman. She had no Gaelic. And her\nEnglish was not our English. This woman could ride a horse, though not\ntoo well. She would put a horse at a jump, though she was afeared of it.\n\n\"This woman had money. She was a niece of the admiral's, and she was on\na long visit to the admiral's house.\n\n\"I've heard tell a queer thing about this woman. She would play at the\npiano for hours on a stretch, reading from a book. For hours she would\nplay, all by herself. The people passing the road and the servant girls\nof the house couldn't make head or tail of her music. But our folk ken\nnothing of the piano. The pipes, the melodeon, the fiddle, they know\nthat--and a few ould ones have heard the harp. They couldn't tell\nwhether it was good music or bad music was in it.\n\n\"There's another queer thing about this woman. When she walked you'd\nthink she was dancing. Not our reels or hornpipes, but queer ould dances\nyou'd be walking to, not stepping. She had wee feet, though she was not\na small woman.\n\n\"Your uncle Alan's dogs took to this woman, and you ken how Alan's\nterriers had little liking for any but his ain sel'. I was told also to\ntell you that she had the dogs, and that they were comfortable, and\nwould be well looked after. So that you need not be worritin' about your\nuncle Alan's dogs....\n\n\"I'm afeared I've given you a poor picture of this woman, Shane\nCampbell: but it's a queer thing, you'd feel this woman more nor you'd\nsee her. In a great deal of people, you wouldn't note her at all. But\nwere you coming along the road, and a fey feeling come over you, and you\nsay: Around the next corner is something kindly, something brave,\nsomething fine; as you turned the corner you'd meet this woman.\n\n\"Your uncle Alan liked this woman, liked her fine, but this woman was\nsick with love for your uncle Alan.\n\n\"You'll blame me sore, Shane Campbell, and rightly too; it was very\ncareless of me, me who's got a careful name--it didn't seem to matter,\nthough! The name of this woman is not at me ...\"\n\nAll the tears in Shane's eyes, all the emptiness in his heart was gone\nnow. A sudden elation seized him. He understood. Alan Donn had done a\nfine brave thing; Alan Donn had done the strong thing, the right thing,\nas Alan always did.\n\nHe thought: Alan was in love with this woman and this woman with Alan,\nand Alan had looked ahead sanely, seen, decided. Thirty years difference\nof age. Dignified strong wisdom and beautiful brave youth, one firm as a\ngreat firm rock, the other with the light wings of birds; spiritually\nnever could they mate. Youth spiritual is like a gosling of yellow down,\nage spiritual is an eagle of great wings.... If the spirit has not\ndied.... Alan would never be an irritated, jealous, paretic old man, nor\nwould he see \"this woman\" grow stern with repression and ache, and\nloneliness of heart and spirit....\n\nAh, he had done it well! A line of Froissart's came to Shane: \"They were\nvery noble; they cared nothing for their lives!\" He had given her no\nshattered marriage, no empty explanation that breeds only bitterness and\nperhaps contempt. He had given her a very gallant memory that would\nexalt her in the coming days.... The world, the flesh, and the devil had\nplayed at cards with Alan Donn, and Alan had won....\n\nHe thought: Were it I now, I should have drifted into this, and come to\nancient tortured days, and not having strength maybe, should have ended,\nnot before as Alan Donn did, gallantly, but afterward, meanly, leaving\nbitterness and desolation.... Ah, wise Alan.\n\nAnd it occurred to him suddenly, wise Alan, fey on the threshold of\ndeath, remembering him: There is virtue in the yellow gorse of Ulster,\nin the purple Ulster heather. Come back to where you were born, and\nrest, and get strength.... This is a deep thing.... Alan knew\nsomething.... The rain and the mist and the wind among the rushes had\ntaught him natural secrets.... Maybe from the ground man drew strength,\nand maybe strange ground was alien to other than its own ... a\nmotherland--why did they call a place a motherland ...? Antaeus, the\nLibyan wrestler, was invincible so long as his feet were on mother\nearth, and Heracles had lifted him into the air and the air had crushed\nhim.... What did the Greek parable mean ...? It meant something ... the\npurple hills ... the purple heather.... The Moyle purple in the setting\nsun....\n\n\"I'll go back,\" he decided. Scots superstition welled up in him. \"A man\nseeing death sees more than death. Sees life. The Keepers of the Door\nmaybe anoint his eyes, and if he looks back for an instant, God knows\nwhat he sees ... I'll go.\"\n\n\"Can I give you a lift back to Ballycastle, Simon Fraser? Or a lift\nanywhere you want. It's the least I can do and you coming this long way\nto tell me news.\"\n\n\"I'm very thankful to you, Shane Campbell, very thankful indeed. It's\njust the way of you to ask a poor sailor man does he want a lift halfway\nacross the world. But I'll never again see Ballycastle with living\neyes.\"\n\n\"And why not, man Simon?\"\n\n\"It's this way, Shane Campbell. It's this way. When I came back after\nsix years--four years lost on the coast of Borneo--my three fine sons\nwere gone--twenty and nineteen and seventeen they were. Gone they were\nfollowing the trade of the sea. And herself the woman of the house was\ngone, too. I didn't mind the childer, for 't is the way of the young to\nbe roving. But herself went off with another man. A great gift of making\na home she had, so there was many would have her, in spite of her forty\nyear. Into the dim City of Glasgow she went, and there was no word of\nher. And she might have waited, Shane Campbell; she might so. Four years\nlost on the coast of Borneo to come and find your childer scattered, and\nyour wife putting shame on you. That's a hard thing.\"\n\n\"You're a young man, Simon Fraser. You're as young as I am, forty-two.\nThere's a quarter-century ahead of you. Put the past by and begin again.\nThere'd be love at many a young woman for you. And a house, and new\nbairns.\"\n\n\"I'm a back-thinking man, Alan's kinsman, a long back-thinking man. And\nI'd always be putting the new beside the old and the new would not seem\ngood to me. The new bairns would never be like the old bairns, and it\nwould na be fair. And as for women, I've had my bellyful of women after\nher I was kind to, and was true to for one and twenty years, going off\nwith some sweating landsman to a dingy town.... I was ay a good sailor,\nShane Oge....\n\n\"It's by now, nearly by.... So I'll be going up and down the sea on the\nchance of meeting one of my new braw bairns. And maybe I'll come across\none of them on the water-front, and him needing me most.... And maybe\nI'll sign articles wi' the one aboard the same ship, and it's the grand\ncracks we'll have in the horse latitudes.... Or maybe I'll find one of\nthem a young buck officer aboard a ship I'm on; and he'll come for'a'd\nand say: 'Lay aloft, old-timer, with the rest and be pretty God-damned\nquick about it.' And I'll say: 'Aye, aye, sir.' And thinks: Wait till\nyou get ashore, and I'll tell you who I am, and give you a tip about\nyour seamanship, too, my grand young fello'.... Life has queerer things\nnor that, Shane Oge, as maybe you know.... The only thing that bothers\nme is that I'll never see Ballycastle any more.\"\n\n\"Is there nothing I can do for you, Simon Fraser?\"\n\n\"There's a wee thing, Shane Campbell; just a wee thing?\"\n\n\"What is it, man Simon?\"\n\n\"Maybe you'd think me crazy--\"\n\n\"Of course not, Simon.\"\n\n\"Well then, when you're home, and looking around you at the whins and\npurple heather, and the wee gray towns, maybe you'll say: 'Glens of\nAntrim, I ken a man of Antrim, and he'll never see you again, but he'll\nnever forget you.' Will you do that?\"\n\n\"I'll do that.\"\n\n\"Maybe you'll be looking at Ballycastle, the town where I was born in.\"\n\n\"Yes, Simon.\"\n\n\"You don't have to say it out loud. You can stop and say it low in\nyourself, so as nobody'll hear you, barring the gray stones of the town.\nJust remember: 'Ballycastle, Simon Fraser's thinking long ...'\"\n\n\nSection 9\n\nA cold southerly drove northward from the pole, chopping the muddy waves\nof the river. Around the floating _camolotes_, islands of weeds, were\nlittle swirls. The poplars and willows of the banks grew more distant,\nas _Maid of the Isles_ cut eastward under all sail. As he tramped fore\nand aft, Buenos Aires dropped, dropped, dropped behind her counter,\ndropped ... became a blur....\n\n_Maid of the Isles_ was only going home, as she had gone home a hundred\ntimes before, from different ports, as she had gone home a dozen times\nfrom this one. But never before had it seemed significant to Shane....\nBack, back the city faded.... If the wind lasted, and Shane thought it\nwould last, by to-morrow they would have left the Plate and be in the\nopen sea. Back, back the city dropped.... It couldn't drop too fast....\nIt was like a prison from which he was escaping, fleeing.... A great\nyearning come on him to have it out of sight ... definitely, forever.\nOnce it was gone, he would know for a certain thing, he was free....\n\nHe was surprised to be free. As surprised as an all but beaten wrestler\nis when his opponent's lock weakens unexpectedly, and dazedly he knows\nhe can get up again and spar. A fog had lifted suddenly, as at sea. And\nhe had thought the mist of the Valley of the Black Pig could never lift,\nwould remain, dank and cold and hollow, covering all things like a\ncerecloth, binding all as chains bind ... and that he must remain with\nthe weeping population, until the Boar without Bristles came ... forever\nand forever and forever....\n\nBut the nearest and dearest had died gallantly, and somehow the fog had\nlifted. And then he was dazed and weak, but free. Where was he going?\nWhat to do? He didn't know, but hope, life itself had come again, like a\nlong awaited moon.\n\nBuenos Aires faded.... Faded the Valley of the Black Pig.... Buenos\nAires its symbol ... Buenos Aires with bleak squares, its hovels, its\npainted trees--_timbo_ and _tipa_ and _palo barracho_....\n\nHe stood aft of the steersman, and suddenly raised his head.\n\n  _Mo mhallacht go deo leat, a bhaile nan gcrann!\n  'S mo shlan do gach baile raibh me riamh ann._\n\n\"My curse forever on you, O town of the trees,\" an old song came to him,\n\"and my farewell to every town I was ever in--\"\n\nA great nostalgia for Ulster, for the whins and heather, choked him:\n\n\"_S iomaidh bealach fliuch salach agas boithrin cam_--\n\n\"There's many a wet muddy highways and crooked half-road, _eader mise_,\nbetween _me_, _eader mise_, _eader mise_--\" He had forgotten.\n\n\"Between me and the townland that my desire is in,\" the Oran steersman\nprompted. \"_Eader mise agas an baile bhfuil mo dhuil ann!_\"\n\n\"Mind your bloody wheel,\" Shane warned. \"This is a ship, not a poetry\nsociety. Look at the way you're letting her come up, you Highland\nbastard. Keep her off--and lam her!\"\n\n\"Lam her it is, sir,\" the steersman grinned....\n\n\n\n\nPART SIX\n\nTHE BOLD FENIAN MEN\n\n\nSection 1\n\nThe worst of it all, Campbell smiled, was this: that life was so\nimmensely healthy now, immensely peaceful, immensely sane. Here he was\nin the house of his fathers, built from the angle of a turret of King\nJohn's time. Here he was by the purple hills, by the purple Moyle. Five\nsprings had come since he had given up the sea. Five times he had seen\nthe little mountain streams swell with the import of the season,\nhurrying from the summit of the eagles, carrying water on nature's\nbusiness. Five times had the primrose come, and the cuckoo. The faint\ndelicate blue of early grass turned to green. The heat haze of summer on\nthe silent glens. The Moyle thick with fish. Then autumn, a deep-bosomed\ngrave woman moving through the reddening woods, the turf-cutters with\ntheir spades, the pillars of blue smoke from the cottages in the stilly\nSeptember sky. And the three great moons of autumn, silver as sixpence.\nFive times the distant trumpeting of the wild swans and winter came, in\ngreat galloping winds, and sweeping sheets of sea-rain. And Moyle tossed\nlike a giant troubled in his sleep. And on the mountain-sides the rowan\nstood up like a proud enemy, and the ash bent humbly, and the dwarf oak\ncrouched under fury. And the wind whistled in the frozen reeds. And with\nthe snow came out the hunted ones unafraid, the red fox, and the badger\nof dark ways, and the cantering hare.\n\nWithout, the wind might roar like cannon, and the sea rise in great\nengulfing waves. Within the old house with its corner dating from King\nJohn's time--so long ago!--was comfort. Here was the library where Robin\nMore--God rest his soul!--had puzzled over the round towers of Ireland\nand written his monograph on the Phenician colony of the County Down,\nand bothered about strange quaint old things, comparing the Celtic cross\nto the sistrum of Egypt, and wondering whether the round towers of\nIreland had aught to do with worship of the sun, and writing of Gaelic\noccultism to Bulwer Lytton, and dreaming of the friend of his youth,\nGoethe, in the dusk. And down in the gun-room were the cups of Alan\nDonn, cups for sailing and cups for golf, and ribbons that horses won.\nAnd in the drawing-room was the needlework of his mother, the precise\nbeautiful broidery ... so like herself, minute, mathematical, not\nsignificant.... And in the kitchen was the red turf, and the flitches of\nbacon in the eaves, and the thick servant girls hustling impatiently,\nand the servant boys in their corduroy trousers bound with rushes at the\nknee ... their heavy brogues, their honest jests of Rabelais ... and in\nthe fold the silent sheep, and great solemn cows warm in their\nmanger....\n\nFive years, going on six now, since he had left the sea, and invested\nhis fortune in a Belfast shipyard, and taken over the homestead of Clan\nCampbell to run as it had always been run, wisely, sanely, healthily....\nThere were the servant boys and girls, with a comfortable roof above\nthem. There were the cotter tenants, satisfied, certain of justice. At\nthe shows his shorthorns took ribbons. For local charities, his duty was\ndone.... But there was something, something lacking....\n\nIt wasn't peace. Peace he had in plenty. The spring of the heather, the\ntang of the sea brought peace. The bats of twilight, and the sallow\nbranches, and the trout leaping in the river at the close of day. And\nthe twilight itself, like some shy girl.... Out of all these came an\nemanation, a cradle-song, that lulled like the song of little waves....\nAnd as for pleasure, there was pleasure in listening to the birds among\nthe trees, to seeing the stooking of barley, to watching the blue banner\nof the flax, to walking on frosty roads on great nights of stars.... To\nriding with the hunt, clumsily, as a sailor does, but getting in at the\ndeath, as pleased as the huntsman, or the master himself.... To the whir\nof the reel as the great blue salmon rushed ... Pleasure, and peace, and\nyet not satisfaction.\n\nHe thought, for a while, that what he missed was the ships, and that,\nsubconsciously, there was some nostalgia for the sea on him. He had gone\nto Belfast thinking that with live timbers beneath his feet, the--the\nvacuum within him would be filled, but the thought of a ship somehow,\nwhen he was there, failed to exalt him. He loved them always, the long\nlive ships, the canvas white as a gull, the delicacy of spars--all the\nbeautiful economy.... But to command one again, to go about the world,\naimlessly but for the bartering of cargo, and to return at the voyage's\nend, with a sum of money--no! no! not enough!\n\nAnd so he came back to the peace and pleasure of the glens, the purple\nheather, and the red berries, the chink of pebbles on the strand. To\nthe hunts on frosty mornings, to the salmon-fishing, to the showing of\ncattle. To peace: to pleasure....\n\nAnd he suddenly asked himself what had he done to deserve this peace,\nthese pleasant days? What right had he to them? What had he given to\nlife, what achieved for the world, that he should have sanctuary?\n\nThe answer put him in a shiver of panic. Nothing!\n\nHe had no right, no title to it. Here he was drawing on to fifty, close\non forty-eight; and he had done, achieved, nothing. He had no wife, no\nchild; had achieved no valorous unselfish deed. Had not--not even--not\neven a little song.\n\n\nSection 2\n\nStrange thing--it hadn't occurred to him at first; but it did now when\nhe thought over it in the winter evenings--was this: that Alan Donn\nCampbell, for all that he was dead these six years and more, existed\nstill, was bigger now than he had ever been in life....\n\nBecause Shane had hated to see the fine boat drawn up, he had put _Righ\nnam Bradan_, the _Salmon King_, Alan Donn's great thirty-footer, into\ncommission, and raced her at Ballycastle and Kingstown, losing both\ntimes. He had ascribed it to sailing luck, the dying of a breeze, the\nsetting of a tide, a lucky tack of an opposing boat. But at Cowes he\nshould have won. Everything was with him. He came in fifth.\n\n\"I can't understand,\" he told one of Alan's old crew.\n\n\"Man,\" the Antrim sailor told him bluntly, \"ye have na' the gift.\"\n\n\"But, Feardoracha, I'm a sailor.\"\n\n\"Aye, Shane Campbell, you're that. For five times seven years you've\nsailed the seven seas. But for racing ye have na' the gift. Alan Donn\nhad it. And 'twas Alan Donn had the gift for the golf, and the gift for\nthe horses. Just the gift. You must not blame yourself, _Shane na\nfairrge_, there's few Alan Donns.\"\n\nAnd thinking to himself in the lamp-lit room, Shane found what the old\nman meant. Beneath the bronzed face, the roaring manner of Alan Donn,\nthere was a secret of alchemy. Rhythm, and concentration like white\nfire. To the most acute tick of the stars he could get a boat over the\nline with the gun. Something told him where breezes were. By will-power\nhe forced out the knowledge of a better tack. As to horses, where was\nhis equal at putting one over a jump? At the exact hair's-breadth of\ntime, he had changed from human being to spirit. It was no longer Alan\nDonn and his horse when he dropped his hands on the neck. There was\nfusion. A centaur sprang.... On the links he remembered him, the smiling\nmask, the stance, the waggle, the white ball. The face set, the eyes\ngleamed.... The terrific explosion.... Not a man and a stick and a piece\nof gutta-percha, but the mind and will performing a miracle with\nmatter.... And Alan Donn was dead six years ... and yet he lived....\n\nHe lived because he had been of great use. He was a standard, a great\nideal. Children who had seen him would remember him forever, and seek to\nemulate the fire and strength of him, having him to measure by as the\nmariner has the star.... In foreign countries they would tell tales of\nhim: There was once a great sportsman in the North of Ireland, Alan Donn\nCampbell by name....\n\nHis father, too, who had been dead so long--mortality had not conquered\nhim. Once in Ballycastle Shane had seen a shawled girl look out to sea\nwith great staring eyes and a wry mouth, and, half whispered, staccato,\nnot quite sung, her fingers twisting her shawl, came a song from her\nwhite mouth:\n\n  _Tiocfaidh an samhradh agas fasfaidh an fear;\n  Agas tiocfaidh an duilleabhar glas do bharr nan gcraobh.\n  Tiocfaidh mo chead gradhle banaghadh an lae,\n  Agas bvailfidh se port ciuin le cumhaidh 'mo dhiaidh._\n\n  The summer will come, and the little grass will grow;\n  And there will come a green thickness to the tops of the trees.\n  And my hundred loves will arise with the dawning of the day,\n  And he will strike a soft tune out of loneliness after me.\n\nA queer stitch came in Shane's heart--a song his father made! And\nfollowing the stitch came a surge of pride. Those songs of his father!\nThe light minor he had heard, and the others--the surge of _An Oig-bhean\nRuaddh_, the Pretty Red Maiden:\n\n\"_Se, do bheatha is an tir seo\"_.... A welcome before you into this\ncountry, O sea-gull more lovely than the queen, than the woman of the\nWest, whom Naesi, son of Usnach, held in the harbor. I could destroy all\nIreland, as far as the Southern sea, but in the end I would be destroyed\nmyself, when my eyes would alight on the white swan with the golden\ncrown....\n\nOr the despairing cry of his poem _Ig Cathair nan g Ceo_: \"In the City\nof the Fogs\"--he meant London--\n\n\"_A athair nan gras tabhair spas o'n eag domh_--O Father of the Graces,\ngive me a little respite from death. Let the ax not yet strike my\nforehead, the way a goat or a pig or a sheep is slain, until I make my\nhumility and my last repentance.\"\n\nShane wished to God he had known his father, that the man had been\nspared a little until he could have loved him.... He had the only\npicture of him left.... Great throat and pale, liquor-harried face,\nburning eyes, and black tossing hair.... The bald-headed bankers might\nshake their heads and say: He was no good ... he was a rake ... he drank\n... his relations with women were not reputable.... And old maids purse\ntheir thin-blooded lips.... But when the little money of the bankers was\nscattered through the world, and even their little chapels had forgotten\nthem, and the stiff bones of old maids were crumbling into an\nunnecessary dust, his father's songs would be sung in Ireland, in Man,\nin the Scottish Highlands, in the battered Hebrides. So long as sweet\nGaelic was spoken and men's hearts surged with feeling, there would be a\nsong of his father's to translate the effervescence into words of\ncadenced beauty.... He had an irreverent vision of God smiling and\ntalking comfortably to his father while the bald-headed bankers cooled\ntheir fat heels and glared at one another outside the picket-gates of\nheaven.... The world had gained something with the last Gaelic bard....\n\nAnd he had found out, too, that his other uncle, Robin More, had a great\nimportance in a certain circle. In Dublin he met an old professor, a\nJesuit priest, who seemed intensely excited that a nephew of Robin More\nCampbell's should be present.\n\n\"Do you know, by any chance, what your uncle was working on when he\ndied?\"\n\n\"I'm afraid I do not, sir.\"\n\n\"You know his manuscripts.\"\n\n\"Just casually, sentimentally.\"\n\n\"You don't know much about your uncle's work, then?\"\n\n\"Not very much.\"\n\n\"Did you know,\" the old priest said--and his urbanity disappeared; there\nwas pique in his tones--\"that your uncle was the man who definitely\ndecided for us that the Highlanders of Scotland migrated from Ireland to\nScotland? Did you know that?\"\n\n\"No, sir, I did not.\"\n\n\"I don't suppose,\" the old man was sarcastic, \"that seems important to\nyou.\"\n\n\"To confess, Dr. Hegan, it does not. Is it?\"\n\n\"My child,\" the old priest smiled--it was so queer to be called \"my\nchild\" at forty-seven--\"all knowledge is important. All details of\nknowledge. We come we know not whence, and we go we hope we know\nwhither. Our history, our motives, our all, is vague. All we have is\nfaith, a great broad river, but knowledge is the little piers ...\"\n\nThey had all been significant: Alan Donn, his father, even Uncle Robin,\nwhom he had thought only a bookworm in the fading sunshine. The world\nwas better, more mature, for their having lived....\n\nAnd he had nothing. Here he was, drawing on to fifty, close on\nforty-eight. And he had done, achieved nothing. He had no wife, no\nchild; had achieved no valorous unselfish deed. Had not--not even--not\neven a little song....\n\n\nSection 3\n\nAnd then he said to himself: \"I am too sensitive. I have always been too\nsensitive. The stature of my family has dwarfed me in my own esteem.\nHaven't I got as much right as others to the quiet of the glens?\" And\nagain he said: \"I sit here and I think. And my thought grows into a\nmaze. And I wander in it, as a man might wander through some old\ngardener's fancy, having stumbled on it inadvertently, and now being in\nit, now knowing the secret of exit.\" But a maze was nonexistent, did a\nperson regard it so, and if one were to walk on nonchalantly a little\nturn would come, and he find himself in the wide sunshine and smiling\nflowers. And he said: \"Damn the subtleties! A person is born, lives,\ndies. And what he does is a matter for himself alone.\" But some inner\nantagonist said: \"You are wrong.\"\n\nAnd he said: \"Look at the people around me. What more right have they\nthan I to this quiet Ulster dusk?\" And the antagonist smiled: \"Well,\nlook.\"\n\nFirst were the farmers and the fisherfolk. Well, they didn't count. They\nwere natural to the soil, as grass was. They grew there, as the white\nbog flower grew. An institution of God, like rain. And then there were\nthe summer visitors, honest folk from the cities. Well, they had a\nright. They spent their winters and autumns and springs in mills and\ncounting-houses, clearing away the commercial garbage of the world. And\nwhen the graciousness of summer came, they emerged, blind as moles,\npeak-faced. And before them stretched the Moyle, a blue miracle. The\ncrisp heather, the thick rushes, the yellow of the buttercups, the black\nbog waters. And when clouds came before the sun the mountains drew great\npurple cloths over them. And in the twilight the cricket chirruped. And\nat night the plover cried out against the vast silence of the moon. And\nthe hearts of the selling people turned from thoughts of who owed them\nmoney and who was harrying them for money. And the tight souls opened,\njust a little perhaps, but even that--Poor garbage men of the world, who\nwould begrudge them a little beauty?\n\nThen there were the country people, the landlords, the owners of the\nsoil. Red-faced, sportsmen, connoisseurs of cattle, a sort of\nsuper-farmer, they were as natural to the soil as the fisherfolk or the\ntillers. Their stock remained from ancient tides of battle, centuries\nbefore. The founders of the families had been Norman barons, Highland\nchiefs, English squires; but the blood had adapted itself, as a plant\nadapts itself in a strange country. And now they were Ulster squires.\nSmiling, shy, independent. They had a great feeling for a horse, and a\npowerful sense of fair play. They were very honest folk. A station had\nbeen set them and they lived in it, honestly, uncomplainingly, quite\nhappily. But a meadow was a piece of land to them and a river a place\nwhere trout could be caught, and snow was a good thing, because it kept\nthe ground warm. They were a folk whom Shane respected a great deal, and\nwho respected him--but they weren't his folk.\n\nAbove all these of his neighbors towered three figures, and the first of\nthese was the admiral.\n\nHe had a name. He had a title, too--Baron Fraser of Onabega. But to\neverybody he was the admiral, and in speech plain \"sir.\" A purple-faced\nand terrible old man, with bushy white eyebrows and eagle's eyes. Very\ntall, four inches over six feet, very erect for all his ninety years,\nwith his presence there thundered the guns of Drake, there came to the\nmind the slash of old Benbow.... He had been a midshipman with Nelson at\nCape Trafalgar.\n\nSilent and fierce, about his head clouds of majesty, all his life had\nbeen spent with pursed lips and hooded eyes, keeping watch for England\n... And never a great battle where he could prove himself the peer of\nBenbow and Drake and Nelson ... Never a dawn when the fleet rolled down\nto battle with polished guns and whipping flags ... And a day came when\nhe was too old ... So here he was in the Antrim glens ...\n\nA great life, his, a great and serviceable life, frustrated of glory ...\nAnd well he deserved the quiet of Ulster, where he sat and wrote his\nlong letters to archaeological papers, proving, he thought, that the\nIrish were a lost tribe of Israel and that the Ark of the Covenant was\nburied on Tara Hill ... And there were none to laugh at him ... All\nspirit he was; watchful, dogged, indomitable spirit with a little husk\nof body ... Soon, as he had directed, his old bearded sailormen would\ntake his flag-covered casket out to sea in the night, and the guns would\nthunder: A British admiral sails by ...\n\nAnd there was Simon Fowler in his little cottage, who was dying by\ninches from some tropical malady ... A small chunky man with white hair\nand wide blue eyes ... He had been a missionary in Africa, in China, in\nIndia--not the missionary of sentimental books, but a prophet whose calm\nvoice, whose intrepid eyes, had gained him a hearing everywhere ...\n\"Put fear away,\" he had preached in Africa; \"let darkness flee. I come\nto tell of the light of the world ... After me will come the sellers of\ngin and of guns. But I shall give you a great magic against them ...\nLittle children love one another ...\" In China his fire had shamed\nphilosophers: \"I know your alms-giving. I know your benevolence. It is\nselfishness. Though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I\ndeliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me\nnothing. Unless ye become as little children ...\" And in the sensuous\nIndian lands, his voice rose in a great shout: \"Subtle Greece is dead,\"\nhe proclaimed, \"and razed are the fanes of Ephesus. And the Unknown God\nslinks only through the midnight streets ...\" \"Blessed are the pure in\nheart ...\" He had gone like a flame through the pagan places of the\nworld, and here he was dying in the Antrim glens, with the quiet of\nChrist about him, the droning of God's little bees, and the lowing of\nthe cattle of Bethlehem ... He was a great man. He had only one\ncontempt: for hired clergymen.\n\nThere were three folk of heroic stature around him: the admiral, and\nSimon Fowler, and the woman of Tusa hErin.\n\n\nSection 4\n\nA very small townland is Tusa hErin, the smallest in Ireland, it is\nsaid. And a very strange name on it: Tusa hErin, the beginning of\nIreland. Why it is so called, none know. Possibly because some\nHighlanders named it this on landing there. Probably because it was a\ndivision between the Scottish and Irish clans. So it was called when the\nBruce fled to Ireland. So it is called to this day.\n\nTwenty acres or so are in it--a wind and sea lashed little estate, a\ngreat gray house and a garden of yew-trees. For ten years it had been\nuntenanted, until a Miss O'Malley had bought it, and opened the great\noak doors, and let the sea-air blow through the windows of it, and\nclipped the garden of the yews. The country people knew little of her,\nexcept that she had a great reserve. To the glensmen she was _Bean Tusig\nErin_, the woman of Tusa hErin.\n\n\"What kind of a person is she?\" Shane asked.\n\n\"A strange woman is in it, your Honor; a strange and dark woman.\"\n\n\"An old lady?\"\n\n\"If she was one of us, she would be an old woman, your Honor, what with\nthe bitter work and the hard ways. But being what she is, she is a young\nwoman, your Honor. I heard tell she said she was thirty-four.\"\n\n\"Is she good-looking?\"\n\n\"Well, now, your Honor, that would surely be a hard thing to say. A\ngreat dark face she has on her, and her head high, the like of a grand\nhorse. Barring her eyes, you might call her a fine woman.\"\n\n\"What's wrong with her eyes?\"\n\n\"Hard eyes she has, your Honor, hating eyes. She's always looking at you\nto see if it is an enemy is in it. A queer woman, your Honor; the like\nof her was never known.\"\n\n\"But how?\"\n\n\"The talk that's at her, your Honor. The great hatred she bes having of\nEngland, and the talk of old Irish times.\"\n\n\"And she a lady?\"\n\n\"You'd think it was a queen was in it, with the high head of her, and\nthe proud step of a racing horse. You would, your Honor, you would so.\"\n\nHe asked the admiral about her.\n\n\"Do you know this Miss O'Malley, sir, of Tusa hErin?\"\n\n\"I had the honor to meet her twice, Campbell. A very great woman. A\ngreat loss, Campbell, a great loss.\"\n\n\"Who is she, sir?\"\n\n\"Good God! Do you mean to tell me you don't know who Grace O'Malley is?\"\n\n\"No, sir, I don't.\"\n\n\"One of the greatest Shaksperian actresses, possibly, the English stage\never knew--and you never heard of her. Good God! How abominably ignorant\nyou merchant marine men are!\"\n\n\"Abominably so, sir ... But please tell me, sir, why does she hate\nEngland so much?\"\n\n\"Oh, these geniuses, Campbell! They must hate something, or love\nsomething to excess ... Depths of feeling, I suppose ... Campbell, do\nyou know anything about Ogham writing?\"\n\n\"Only that it's straight lines on the corners of stones, sir!\"\n\n\"Well, now, I think I've discovered something important, most terribly\nimportant ... You may have heard of the Babylonian cuneiform script ...\"\nand the old gentleman was off full gallop on his hobby ...\n\nFrom Simon Fowler he extracted a little more information.\n\n\"Fowler, do you know Miss O'Malley of Tusa hErin?\"\n\n\"I do, poor lady.\"\n\n\"Why poor lady?\"\n\n\"Wouldn't you call any one poor lady who had just been widowed, then\nlost her two children? Poor lady, I wish I could say something to\ncomfort her.\"\n\n\"You! Fowler! You couldn't say anything?\"\n\n\"The wisdom of God, Shane, is sometimes very hard to see. Our physical\neyes can only see a little horizon, and yet the whole world is behind\nit. Miss O'Malley is not a case for any of the ministers of God ... but\nfor Himself ...\"\n\n\"You exaggerate, Fowler. Surely you are wrong ... They say she is young\nand proud and beautiful.\"\n\n\"I don't know. I never noticed ... She may be young and proud and\nbeautiful ... I only thought of the dark harassed thing--inside all the\nyouth and pride and beauty ...\"\n\n\nSection 5\n\nHe met her for the first time at a neighboring fair ...\n\nEleven on a hot June morning, and the little town was crowded, like some\nold-time immigrant ship. Women in plaid shawls and frilled caps, men in\nsomber black as befitted a monthly occasion. Squawking of ducks and\nhens, trudging of donkeys, creaking of carts, unbelievably stubborn\nbullocks and heifers being whacked by ash-plants, colts frisking. Girls\nwith baskets of eggs and butter; great carts of hay and straw.\nApple-women with bonnets of cabbage-leaves against the sun. Herring-men\nbawling like auctioneers. Squealing of young pigs. An old clothes dealer\nhoarse with effort. A ballad singer split the air with an English\ntranslation of _Bean an Fhir Ruaidh_, \"The Red-haired Man's Wife.\"\n\n  Ye Muses Nine,\n      Combine, and lend me your aid,\n  Until I raise\n      the praise of a beautiful maid--\n\nThe crash of a drover driving home a bargain:\n\n\"Hold out your hand now, by God! till I be after making you an offer.\nSeven pound ten, now. Hell to my soul if I give you another ha' penny.\nWait now. I 'll make it seven pound fifteen.\"\n\n\"Is it insulting the fine decent beast you are?\"\n\n\"Eight pounds five and ten shillings back for a luck-penny?\"\n\n\"Is it crazy you've gone all of a sudden, dealing man. If the gentle\ncreature was in Dublin town, sure they'd be hanging blue ribbons around\nher neck until she wilted with the weight of them.\"\n\n\"It's hanging their hats on the bones of her they'd be, and them\nsticking out the like of branches from a bush.\"\n\n\"Yerra Jasus! Do you hear the man, and her round as a bottle from the\nfine filling feeding. You could walk your shin-bones off to the knee,\nand you'd not find a cow as has had the treatment of this cow. Let you\nbe on our way now.\"\n\n\"Look, honest man. Put out your hand, and wait till I spit on my fist--\"\n\nThrough the doors of Michael Doyle's public house a young farmer walked\nuncertainly. He gently swung a woman's woolen stocking in his right\nhand, and in the foot of the stocking was a large round stone:\n\n\"I am young Packy McGee of Ballymoyle,\" he announced, \"the son of old\nPacky McGee of Ballymoyle, a great man in his day, but never the equal\nof young Packy McGee. I have gone through Scotland and Ireland, Wales,\nthe harvest fields of England, and I have never yet found the equal for\nmurder and riot of young Packy McGee. I am young Packy McGee. I am young\nPacky McGee of Ballymore, and I don't care who knows it. Is there any\ndecent man in this fair that considers himself the equal of young Packy\nMcGee?\" And he walked through the fair, chanting his litany and gently\nswinging the woman's woolen stocking with the large round stone in the\nfoot of it ...\n\nThe penny poet changed from the high grace notes of \"The Red-Haired\nMan's Wife\" to the surge of a come-all-ye. There was the undercurrent of\na pipe drone to his voice:\n\n  Fare-you-well, Enniskillen, fare-you-well for a while,\n  All round the borders of Erin's green isle\n  And when the war 's over return I shall soon,\n  And your arms will be o-o-open for your Enniskillen Dragoon.\n\nIn the intervals between verses a black-bearded man with blue spectacles\nannounced solemnly that he was Professor Handley direct from English and\nGerman universities, empowered by the Rosicrucian order to distribute a\nremarkable panacea at the nominal sum of sixpence a bottle ...\n\nForests of cows' horns and drovers' sticks, clamor of frightened cattle,\nemphatic slapping of palms. Clouds of dust where the horse fair was\ncarried on. Stands of fruit and cakes. Stalls of religious ornaments,\nprayer-books, and rosary beads ... A shooting gallery ... A three-card\ntrickster, white and pimpled of face ... A trick-of-the-loop man, with\nsoap-box and greasy string ... A man who sold a gold watch, a\nsovereign, and some silver for the sum of fifteen shillings ... An old\nman with the Irish bagpipes, bellows strapped to arm, playing \"The Birds\nAmong the Trees,\" \"The Swallow-tail Coat,\" \"The Green Fields of America\"\n... small boys regarding him curiously ... later young farmers and girls\nwould be dancing sets to his piping ... At the end of the street a\nballad-monger declaiming, not singing--his head thrown back, his voice\nissuing in a measured chant ... \"The Lament for the Earl of Lucan\":\n\n  Patrick Sarsfield, Ireland's wonder!\n  Fought in the field like bolts of thunder!\n  One of Ireland's best commanders!\n  Now is food for the crows of Flanders!\n              Och! Ochone!\n\nA knot of older people had gathered around him, white-headed farmers,\nbent turf-cutters of the glens, a girl-child with eyes like saucers. A\npriest stopped to listen ... The crude English of the ballad faded out,\nuntil there was nothing but disheveled agony ... rhythm ... a wail ...\nSomewhere a leaping current of feeling ... There was a woman on the edge\nof the crowd, a lady ... She came nearer, as though hypnotized ...\n\nThe country bard stopped suddenly, exalted, and swung dramatically into\nGaelic ... Dropping the alien tongue he seemed to have dropped\nfetters.... His voice rose to a paean ... he took on stature ... he\nlooked straight in the eye of the sun ... And for Shane the clamor of\nthe drovers ceased ... And there was the plucked note of harpers ... And\nfires of ancient oak ... and wolf-dogs sleeping on skins of elk ... And\nthere was a wasted place in the twilight, and grass through a split\nhearthstone ... And a warrior-poet, beaten, thinking bitter under the\nstars ...\n\n  _Do threasgar an saoghal agas do thainic an gaoth mar smal--\n  Alastrom, Caesar, 's an mead do bhi da bpairt;\n  Ta an Teamhair na fear agas feach an Traoi mar ta!\n  'S na Sasanaigh fein, do b' fheidir go bhfaigh dis bas!_\n\nA voice spoke excitedly, imperiously to Shane:\n\n\"What is he saying? Do you know Gaelic?\"\n\n\"I'm afraid I've forgotten my Gaelic, but I know this song.\"\n\n\"Then what is it? Please tell me. I must know.\"\n\n\"He says:\n\n  \"The world conquers them all. The wind whirls like dust.\n  Alexander, Caesar, and the companies whom they led.\n  Tara is grass, and see how Troy is now!\n  And the English themselves, even they may die.\"\n\n\"How great!\" she said. \"How very great!\" She turned to Shane, and as he\nsaw the dark imperious face, he knew intuitively he was speaking to the\nWoman of Tusa hErin. She seemed puzzled for an instant. Something in\nShane's clothes, his carriage ...\n\n\"You don't look as if you understood Gaelic? How is it you can translate\nthis poem?\"\n\n\"I knew it as a boy. My father was a Gaelic poet.\"\n\n\"Then you are Shane Campbell.\"\n\n\"And you are the woman of Tusa hErin!\"\n\n\"You know Tusa hErin?\"\n\n\"I know every blade of grass in the glens.\"\n\n\"If you are ever near Tusa hErin, come and see me.\"\n\n\"I should like to.\"\n\n\"Will you really?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nShe left him as abruptly as she spoke to him, going over to the\nballad-monger. She left him a little dazed ... He was aware of vitality\n... He was like a man on a wintry day who experiences a sudden shaft of\nwarm sun, or somebody in quiet darkness whose eye is caught by the\nrising of the moon.\n\n\nSection 6\n\nAs in a story from some old unsubtle book, in passing the gates of Tusa\nhErin, he had gone into another world, a grave and courteous world, not\nantique--that was not the word, but just older ... A change of tempo ...\nA change of atmosphere ... The _Bois Dormant_, the Sleeping Wood of the\nFrench fairy-tale?... Not that, for the Sleeping Wood should be a gray\nwood, a wood of twilight, with the birds a-drowse in their nests ... And\nhere were clipped rich yew-trees, and turf firm as a putting-green's,\nand rows of dignified flowers, like pretty gracious ladies; and a little\nlake where a swan moved, as to music; and the sunshine was rich as wine\nhere ... all golden and green ... But the atmosphere? He thought of the\ncave of Gearod Oge, the Wizard Earl in the Rath of Mullaghmast, and the\nstory of it ... A farmer man had noticed a light from the old fort, and\ncreeping in he had seen men in armor sleeping with their horses beside\nthem ... And he examined the armor and the saddlery, and cautiously half\ndrew a sword from its sheath ... And the soldier's head rose and:\n\"_Bhfuil an trath ann?_\" his voice cried ... \"Has the time come?\" \"It is\nnot, your Honor,\" the farmer said in terror, and shoved the sword back\nand fled ... An old man said for a surety that had the farmer drawn the\nblade from the scabbard, the Wizard Earl would have awakened, and\nIreland been free ... There was great beauty and great Irishness to that\nstory, but there was terror to it, and there was no terror on this sweet\nplace ...\n\nHe said: It is a trick of my head, an illusion that this is different.\nSome shading that comes from the yews, some phenomenon of cliff and\nwater ... But even that did not circumscribe the rich grave look of\ngrounds and house. A song from \"The Tempest\" came to him:\n\n  Full fathom five thy father lies;\n    Of his bones are coral made;\n  Those are pearls that were his eyes:\n   Nothing of him that doth fade\n  But doth suffer a sea-change\n  Into something rich and strange ...\n\nThat was it, something rich and strange, like some old cloister into\nwhich one might turn from an inquiet and hubbubby street ... A knock at\nan oaken wicket; a peering shy brother, and one was on green lawns and\nthe shadows of a gabled monastery. Cowled, meditative friars, and the\nquiet of Christ like spread wings ... But there was a reason for the\ncloister's glamour: cool thoughts and the rhythm of quiet praying, and\nthe ringing of the little bell of mass, and the cadenced sacramental.\nAll these were sympathetic magic ... But whence came the glamour of Tusa\nhErin?\n\n\nSection 7\n\nAnd she said: \"I am glad you came. I knew somehow you would.\"\n\n\"I am glad, too. I knew Tusa hErin as a boy. It was then a weird old\nplace. The yew-trees were unclipped, the turf riotous, the little lake\nungraveled ... It had an eeriness. But now--it is very different.\"\n\n\"Any place is different for being loved, tended.\"\n\n\"I suppose so. One loves but one gets careless toward ... I know Antrim\nhas always had an immense attraction for me ...\"\n\n\"Antrim--alone?\"\n\n\"Yes, of course, Antrim.\"\n\n\"Not all Ireland, then?\"\n\n\"I never thought of Ireland as all Ireland.\"\n\n\"O Shane Campbell, you've sailed so much and seen so much--China, they\ntell me, and South America, and the Levant. And in the North, Archangel.\nI'll warrant you don't know Ireland.\"\n\n\"I never saw much, though, in any place outside Antrim.\"\n\n\"You never saw much in the little towns of the Pale, or gray Dublin,\nwith the Parliament where Grattan spoke now a money-changer's business\nhouse, and the bulk of Trinity of Goldsmith and Burke--or the great wide\nstreets where four-in-hands used to go. And Three-Rock Mountain. And\nBray. And the beauty of the Boyne Valley. And the little safe harbors of\nthe South. And the mountains of Kerry. And all the kingdom of Connacht.\nAnd the great winds of Donegal.\"\n\n\"But it's so eery, deserted, a dead country. All like Tusa hErin was\nbefore you took it.\"\n\n\"If one could take it all, and do to it as I've done to Tusa hErin. By\nthe way,\" she asked suddenly, \"is Tusa hErin haunted?\"\n\n\"No, I never heard. Did you see anything?\"\n\n\"I think I heard something a few times. A piper piping when the storms\nrose. A queer little tune--like that thing about McCrimmon.\"\n\n\"_Cha till, cha till, cha till McCrimmon._\"\n\n\"Are there words to it?\"\n\n  \"_Le cogadh mo sidhe cha till McCrimmon._\"\n  Never, never, never, will return McCrimmon.\n  With war or peace never will come McCrimmon.\n  For money or spoil never will return McCrimmon.\n  He will come no more till the Day of the Gathering.\n\n\"A lamenting tune like that, I heard.\"\n\n\"The drone was just the grinding of the waves, the air the wind among\nthe yews.\"\n\n\"That's possible. But isn't a phantom piper possible, too, in a land of\nghosts?\"\n\n\nSection 8\n\n\"A land of ghosts\"; the phrase remained with him. And the lighted lamp\nand the burning peat fire seemed to invoke like some necromantic ritual.\nHow often, and he a young boy, had the names trumpeted through his\nbeing. Brian Boru at Clontarf, and the routed red Danes. And with the\nrouting of the Danes, Ireland had come to peaceful days, and gentle\nwhite-clothed saints arose and monasteries with tolling bells, and great\nCeltic crosses.... And gone were the Druids, their cursing stones, their\nOgham script.... Gone old Celtic divinities, Angus of the Boyne, and\nManannan, son of Lir, god of the sea ... and the peace of Galilee came\nover the joyous hunting land.... The little people of the hills, with\ntheir pygmy horses, their pygmy pipes, cowered, went into exile, under\nthe thunder of Rome.... And the land was meek that it might inherit the\nkingdom of heaven.... And the English came.... The Earls of Ulster fled\ninto Spain.... And only here and there was a memory of old-time heroes,\nof Cuchulain of the Red Branch; of Maeve, queen of Connacht, in her\nfighting chariot, her great red cloak; of Dermot, who abducted Grania\nfrom the king of Ireland's camp, and knew nine ways of throwing the\nspear.... The O'Neils remembered Shane, who brought Queen Elizabeth to\nher knees with love and terror.... And Owen Roe, the Red.... And the\nyounger Hugh O'Neil, with his hardbitten Ulstermen at Benburb.... They\nhad to bring the greatest general of Europe, Cromwell, the lord\nprotector, to subdue the Ulster clans.... Sullen peace, and the Stuarts\ncame back, and again Ireland was lulled with their suave manners, the\nscent of the white rose.... The crash of the Boyne Water, and King James\nrunning for his life.... And Limerick's siege, and the Treaty, and\nPatrick Sarsfield and the Wild Geese setting wing for France.... France\nknew them, Germany, Sweden, even Russia.... Ramillies and the\nSpaniard knew Lord Clare's Dragoons.... And Fontenoy and the thunder of\nthe Irish Brigade.... And Patrick Sarsfield, Earl of Lucan, dead at the\nend of the day.... Even to-day Europe knew them: O'Donnel, Duke of\nTetuan and grandee of Spain; and Patrice McMahon, Duke of Magenta, who\nhad been made president of the Republic of France--they were of the\nstrain of Lucan's wild Geese....\n\n[Illustration]\n\nAnd again a sullen peace, and Ulster rang to the trumpet of American\nfreedom, and the United Irishmen arose in Belfast.... And Napper Tandy\nat Napoleon's court, and Hoche with his ships in Bantry Bay.... Wolfe\nTone's mangled throat, and Lord Edward Fitzgerald murdered by his\ncaptors....\n\nWhat had made these men, sane men--Ulstermen mostly--risk life and face\ndeath so gallantly? What brought out the men of '48 and the men of '67?\nWhat was making little Bigger fight so savagely in Parliament, blocking\nthe legislation of the empire? What had got under their skins, into\ntheir blood? Surely not for a gray half-deserted city? Surely not for\nlittle bays and purple mountains? Surely not for an illiterate\npeasantry, half crazed by the fear of hell?\n\nHe tried to see Ireland as a personality, as one sees England, like the\ngreat Britannia on a copper penny, helmeted, full-breasted,\ngreat-hipped, with sword and shield, a bourgeois concept of majesty, a\nponderous, self-conscious personality:\n\n  When Britain first, at Heaven's command\n  Arose from out the azure main,--\n\nJust like that!\n\nAnd Scotland he could see as a young woman, in kilt and plaid and\nGlengarry cap, a shrewd young woman though, with a very decisive\npersonality, clinching a bargain as the best of dealers might, a little\nforward. He could think of her as the young girl whose hand Charles the\nYoung Pretender kissed, and who had said to him directly: \"I'd liefer\nhae a buss for my mou'.\" \"I'd rather have a kiss on my mouth.\" Scotland\nknew what she wanted and got it, a pert, a solid, a likable girl.\n\nBut Ireland, Ireland of the gray mists, the gray towns. How to see her?\nThe country ballad came to him. The \"Shan Van Vocht,\" the poor old\nwoman, gray, shawled, pitiable, whom her children were seeking to\nreinstate in her home with many fields:\n\n  And where will they have their camp?\n    Says the Shan Van Vocht.\n  And where will they have their camp?\n      Says the Shan Van Vocht.\n    In the Curragh of Klidare,\n      The boys will all be there.\n    With their pikes in good repair,\n      Says the Shan Van Vocht.\n        To the Curragh of Kildare\n          The boys they will repair,\n  And Lord Edward will be there,\n    Says the Shan Van Vocht.\n\nNo! Not enough. One might work, sacrifice money, for the Shan Van\nVocht--but life, no! He thought again. Poor Mangan's poem flashed into\nhis mind and heart....\n\n  O my Dark Rosaleen,\n    Do not sigh, do not weep!\n  The priests are on the ocean green\n    They march along the deep.\n  There's wine from the royal pope\n    Upon the ocean green.\n  And Spanish ale shall give you hope,\n      My dark Rosaleen!\n      My own Rosaleen!\n  Shall glad your heart, shall give you hope,\n  Shall give you health, and help, and hope,\n      My dark Rosaleen!\n\nAh, that was it! Not pity, but gallant, fiery love. Modern ideals and\nancient chivalry.... A young dark woman with a quivering mouth, with\neyes bright in tears.... There was an old favorite print that portrayed\nher, a slim wistful figure resting a pale hand on a mute harp, a great\nelk-hound at her feet on guard, and back of her the rising sun shone on\nthe antique round tower.... A pretty picture, but was it enough? He\ntried to envisage her close, concentrated.... There the dog, there the\nharp, there the slim form.... But the face.... It seemed to elude him.\nAnd suddenly it flashed at him with abrupt dark beauty ... the face of\nthe woman of Tusa hErin....\n\n\nSection 9\n\nThe long Ulster twilight had set in, the twilight of bats, gray-blue,\nutterly peaceful ... the little chiming of the sea.... Even the wind was\nstill.... All things drowsed, like a dog before the fire, relaxed but\nnot asleep.... Beneath her feet the turf was firm ... beneath that the\nhush-een-husho of the purple Moyle.... Soon there would be a moon and\nher servants would saddle Shane's horse for him and he would ride home\nin the Antrim moonlight, eighteen miles of grim road with the friendly\nmoon above him, and the singing Moyle on his left hand, and on his\nright the purple glens.... And the shadows ... the delicate tracery of\nthe ash-tree, and the tall rowans, and the massive blue shadows of the\ncliffs ... a golden and silver land.... A very sweet silence had fallen\nbetween them, as if music had ceased and become restful color.... They\nwatched the quiet swan....\n\n\"I am a little afraid to leave Tusa hErin,\" she said suddenly and\nsoftly, as though thinking aloud.... \"I am like a nun who has been in a\nconvent.... She is lost in the open world.... Will I ever again find a\nplace like Tusa hErin?\"\n\n\"Granya, are you selling Tusa hErin?\"\n\n\"I have sold it, Shane.\"\n\n\"I am sorry,\" was all he could say. A little silence, and he could feel\nher smiling through the dusk.\n\n\"You never ask any questions, Shane?\"\n\n\"It never occurs to me to ask them, Granya. If any one wants to tell me\na thing, I know they will, and if they don't why should I intrude?\"\n\n\"I should like to tell you why I sold Tusa hErin. But I cannot. It is my\nown secret.\"\n\nHe nodded in the dusk: \"I understand.\"\n\nShe turned to him slowly. Her sweet dark head was like some fragrant\nshrub.... Her low soft voice had so much life to it....\n\n\"I wonder if you know what a friend you are, Shane? If you understand\nhow peaceful it is to have you here? You are such a sweet fact, Shane,\nlike the moon.\"\n\n\"I am a friend, Granya....\"\n\n\"You are, yes.... And you know so little about me, Shane. And I know all\nabout you.... I know the adventures of your youth.... And of the hard\ngirl of Louth, and the poor harassed woman of Marseilles.... And of the\nlittle Syrian wife whom you didn't know you loved until you lost her ...\nand the gray voyages to the cruel country.... At times I see you like a\nlittle boy hunting the leprechawn.... And then I see your face, your\neyes, and understand how you commanded men in ships.... You are like\nsome beautiful play, Shane.... I wonder what is the ending?\"\n\n\"It is already ended, Granya.\"\n\n\"No, Shane. I know, the end hasn't come.... I know you, Shane,\" she\nasked abruptly; \"what do you know about me?\"\n\n\"Nothing much, Granya, except that you are you. I heard you were a great\nactress ... and that you had two babies ... who died....\"\n\n\"Not a great actress, Shane, a very good one, perhaps. I might have been\ngreat one day ... and again, I mighn't. I shall never know.... And I\nhad two babies.... They were very nice little people, Shane. I was very\nfond of them.... But a physical life is a little thing, I have come to\nbelieve, and there is another life, a life of thought and emotion. And\nthat one is so long.... It seems ages since I was an actress and had two\npretty babies. It seems in another life.... Shane, I don't think I was\nalive until my babies died....\"\n\n\"I don't understand, Granya.\"\n\n\"I mean this, Shane, that things were so casual to me. They came and\nthey went, and I was what I was, and that was all.... When you were a\nboy, Shane, you had what I never had--wonder. I was the child of actors,\nShane, brought up to a mechanical tradition, knowing the business\nthoroughly--a part was words and directions, and a salary.... That\nthings were mimic meant nothing ... do you see? That there was a life\nthat was unreal, and another life that was real, and then a further\nlife, too subtle, too profound for the value of words ... one sees\nglimpses ... one feels ... and when you try to fix it, it eludes you. Do\nyou understand? Like your mirage, a little.... That is only a symbol....\nAm I talking nonsense, Shane? Anyway, I took things, well, just\ncasually....\n\n\"See the moon rising, Shane?\" she paused. She turned again.\n\n\"I got married, just got married; he was a good man, Shane. But I didn't\nlove him. I loved nobody. I got married because he was a suitable and\nevery one got married. And just the same way I accepted marriage.... And\nwhen he died, I was very sorry, but impersonally sorry ... as if\nsomething nice in the world had been gone ... a swan shot....\n\n\"And my little people, Shane, they were very nice little people.... I\nwas fond of them, but as I might be fond of some terrier dogs.... I was\ngood to them.... Often I sit here and wonder: Was I good enough? And,\nShane, God is my witness and this garden, and the moon above, there is\nnothing I could give them I held back....\n\n\"You know how they died, Shane?... I was playing and my house went on\nfire, and the servants fled.... When I came back from the theater a\npoliceman said: 'We got everything all right, Miss O'Malley. Your dogs,\nyour piano.' ... 'Where did you put the babies?' I asked.... They said:\n'What babies?'\n\n\"Shane, I knew after a little while that I cried too easily ... a little\nsweet rain of affection ... April ... I didn't forget them.... I\nwouldn't let myself.... And then I thought: God! if I had loved my\nhusband my heart would have been like a cracked cup when he died.... And\nwhen my babies died, I could not have lived.... And all I shed of tears\nwas a little shower of April.... O Shane, one isn't like that when one\nis hurt.... Do you remember David, Shane, when he went up to the chamber\nover the gate ... and as he went thus he said, 'O my son Absalom, my son\nAbsalom! would God I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son!' ...\nAnd he was only a man, Shane....\n\n\"Am I bothering you, Shane? No? I am just thinking aloud, with you\nthere.... I never thought I could, with any human being....\n\n\"And then I knew, Shane.... Part of me was not alive.... That was\nterrible to know, like finding out a horrible deformity, or knowing you\nare insane.... And I began to watch people.... I could say: There is a\nwoman who knows she is loved, Shane.... There is a radiance in her face,\nan indescribable something.... You remember the Bible word 'Shechinah,'\nthe glory of the Lord!... And there were women with children ... that\nhad lost themselves in the joy of giving ... would always have that joy\nof giving.... And it made me feel strange, shameful ... as though I had\nno breasts....\n\n\"I must have been a little insane then, Shane. I would go along the\nstreets, looking at people, and saying: 'That person looks as if they\nwould understand,' and thinking of stopping them with: 'Please, a\nmoment, there is something wrong with me!' But I knew they wouldn't\nunderstand ... wouldn't believe it real.... Even if they were kind, all\nthey would say was: 'It's all imagination ... as if imagination were not\nthe most terrible thing in the world.... All that is wrong with the poor\nmad people is imagination.... Shane, I was like some poor cripple\nholding out his deformity to the passers-by, asking for help.... All he\nwould want was money, but I wanted ... oh, I don't know what I\nwanted....\n\n\"And, then, Shane, I would go into a church, and pray, and wait,\nkneeling there, for something to happen.... It never happened.... Then I\nwould laugh. People used to turn and look at me.... I began to hate\nthem. I grew proud. I hated them more and more....\n\n\"I said I'd get back to work, and forget it all.... I was made as I was\nmade.... Accept it.... I thought I could.... I was to play _Lady\nMacbeth_ in Nottingham.\n\n\"You know how she enters, Shane. She comes in reading a letter. She is\nalone on the stage, in _Macbeth's_ castle of Inverness: '\"They met me in\nthe day of success,\"' she reads--_Macbeth_ is writing of the witches in\nthe desert place: '\"and I have learned by the perfectest report, they\nhave more in them than mortal knowledge.\"' I came on as I always came\non.... And the moment I left the wings, Shane, saw the audience, a\nstrange thing happened.... Illusion died, not died ... but was dead....\nAnd there I was supposed to be reading a letter that had never been\nwritten by people who had never possibly an existence, before an\naudience who had paid a little money to be amused.... I couldn't read\nit. I just couldn't....\n\n\"Behind me in the wings they were prompting, whispering fiercely.... But\nI couldn't.... I stood there.... Then I said: I'll go off the stage. But\nI couldn't do that even.... My feet were shackled to the ground.... I\nseemed to have been charmed.... My hand fell to my side.... And then a\npanic came. My knees hit one another. My teeth chattered ... awful,\nawful....\n\n\"There was such a silence. The audience stirred, whispered.... Then some\none laughed.... Never laugh, Shane, suddenly, with me.... I crumpled up.\nThey rang the curtain down ... I stole away to Ireland.... Whenever I\nam not hating--enough, the thought of that laugh comes to me....\" She\nshivered on her seat.\n\n\"That was only nervousness, Granya. Somebody got nervous and laughed.\"\n\n\"No, Shane, no.\"\n\n\"They talk of people laughing in the face of death. It's just a nervous\naction, Granya.\"\n\n\"I tell you, no, Shane.\" She grew vehement. \"It's a cruel country,\nEngland. And Shane, they hate us Irish. As long as we are pleasant,\nwitty, as long as we are buffoons ... but let us be human beings, Shane,\nand they hate us.\"\n\n\"Don't be silly, Granya!\"\n\n\"I'm not silly, Shane. I know. They hate us because we have something\nthey have not. The starved Irish peasant is higher than the English\npeer. He has a song in his heart, a gay song or a sad song, and his eyes\nsee wonders....\"\n\n\"But, Granya, we are only a little people, and they all but rule the\nworld.... You are wrong. They don't hate us.\"\n\n\"Do you remember Haman, Shane; Haman who had everything:\n\n\"'And Haman told them of ... all the things wherein the king had\npromoted'; and he said: 'Yet all this availeth me nothing so long as I\nsee Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king's gate.'\"\n\n\"Shane, do you remember how Haman died?\"\n\n\"Granya!\"\n\nShe rose. Her hands stretched out to the Irish hills. Her voice took on\nthe throbbing of drums:\n\n  \"Oh! the Erne shall run red\n    With redundance of blood,\n  The earth shall rock beneath our tread,\n    And flame wrap hill and wood,\n  And gun-peal and slogan-cry\n    Make many a glen serene,\n  Ere you shall fade, ere you shall die,\n      My dark Rosaleen!\n      My own Rosaleen!\"\n\n\"Poor Granya!\" he said. He caught and kissed her hand.\n\nShe let her other fall on his shoulder for an instant.\n\n\"Good night, Shane!\" she said abruptly. She moved swiftly toward the\nhouse through the yew-trees. In her pale dress against the moonlit turf,\nbetween the dark trees, she was like some old, heart-wringing ghost....\n\n\nSection 10\n\nHe brought back from Tusa hErin that night a sense of dread. What in\nGod's name had Granya done? To what committed herself? There were rumors\nabroad that the men of '67 were not dead yet.... In America, in the\nhills of Kerry, in Galway, there was plotting ... not glorious, but\nsinister plotting.... God! had they enmeshed her?\n\nHe had three times heard her sing the old Ulster ballad of General\nMunro:\n\n  Up came Munro's sister, she was well dressed in green,\n  And his sword by her side that was once bright and keen.\n  And she said to the brave men who with her did go,\n  \"Come, we'll have revenge for my brother Munro!\"\n\nHe had looked on that as only a queer romantic gesture, but with what\nshe said last night, it occurred to him that there was a deeper motif to\nit all.... She was often in Dublin these days.... Did they? Had they?...\n\nIf it had been the Jacobite times, or '98 or even '48, he would not have\nminded. The Irish might call these Irish rebellions, but in reality\nthey were world affairs. James and the Prince of Orange were the clash\nof the ideal of courtliness and tradition worn to a thin blade and of\nthe stubborn progress of pulsing thought. And '98 was the echo of the\nsurge for liberty--the frenzy of France and the stubborn Yankee\nsteel.... And '48 was another breathing of the world.... Even '67 he\nwould not have minded. Sixty-seven was a gallant romantic rally, a dream\nof pikes amid green banners, and men drilling by moonlit rivers....\n\nBut to-day was different.... Revenge was in the air, and revenge was no\nwild justice, as an old writer had said. Revenge was an evil\npossession.... An exhausting, sinister mood.... The men who would fight\nthis modern battle, if battle there was to be one, were dark scowling\nmen.... The amenities of battle, the gallantry of flags meant nothing to\nthem. They would shoot from behind ditches in the dark.... In America\nwas talk of dynamite--an idealist using a burglar's trick.... There was\nno gallantry that way....\n\nAnd besides, it wasn't an Irish war. It was a matter of agriculture....\nA war of peasants against careless landlords, Irish themselves in the\nmain, who had fled to England to avoid the suicidal monotony of Irish\ncountry life, and lost their money in the pot-houses and gambling-dens\nof London, and turned to their tenants for more, forgetting in the\nglamour of London the poverty of the Irish bogs.... It was contemptible\nto squeeze the peasants as a money-lender squeezes his victims, but the\npeasants' redress, the furtive musket and horrible dynamite, that was\nterrible. God, what a mess!... And had Granya been caught into that evil\nproblem, a kingfisher among cormorants?\n\nAnd if she had what was he going to do about it?\n\nWhat could he do? What right had he to meddle with her destiny? Friendly\nthey had become, close sweet friends--the thought of her was like the\nthought of the hills purple with heather,--but friendship and destiny\nare a sweet curling wave and a gaunt cliff. They were two different\npeople, independent. Shane Campbell and the Woman of Tusa hErin.\n\n\nSection 11\n\nShe had been distraught all the evening. Merry, feverishly merry at\ntimes, and again silent, her eyes far off, her mouth set. She rose\nsuddenly from the piano she was playing, and looked at him. Standing,\nabove the light of the candles, her face and head were like some dark\nsoft flower.\n\n\"Shane, you are a very true friend of mine, aren't you?\"\n\n\"Yes, Granya.\"\n\n\"If I wanted a very great favor, would you consider it?\"\n\n\"Not consider, but do it.\"\n\n\"Yes, but the risk,\" she faltered. \"I hardly dare--\"\n\n\"What risk? What are you talking about, Granya?\" A thought struck him.\n\"Is it money? Don't be silly and talk about risk! Anything I can give\nyou is yours, and welcome!\"\n\n\"It's not money, Shane. And thank you! It's--it's this--\"\n\n\"Yes, Granya.\"\n\n\"It's this, Shane. Would you--would you bring a ship for me from St.\nPetersburg to Lough Foyle, very quietly?\"\n\n\"What kind of a ship?\"\n\n\"A ship, just a ship, a sailing-ship.\"\n\n\"What's in the ship?\"\n\nShe paused. \"Guns, Shane.\"\n\n\"No, Granya. I won't.\"\n\n\"Oh, well,\" she sat down, \"I shouldn't have asked.\"\n\n\"Granya,\" he walked over and caught her shoulder, \"don't be foolish.\"\n\n\"I'm not foolish, Shane. If I am, it's done now.\" She smiled.... The air\ncrashed out beneath her fingers. Her voice rang:\n\n  In came the captain's daughter--the captain of the Yeos--\n  Saying, \"Brave United Irishmen, we'll ne'er again be foes.\n  One thousand pounds I'll give to you, and go across the sea;\n  And dress myself in man's attire and fight for liberty!\"\n\n\"You'll not move one foot from Tusa hErin!\"\n\n\"O Shane, Tusa hErin's no longer mine, and I've got to go.\"\n\n\"Because the ship and the guns are mine, Shane,\" she smiled quietly; \"my\npresent.\"\n\nWith a terrific smash of the fist he broke in the top of the piano. The\nwires jangled in pandemonium. The candles fell to the floor.\n\n\"Hell's fire and God's damnation!\" He swore at her. \"You fool!\"\n\nShe rose, her breasts heaving. Her eyes flashed.\n\n\"You've no right to speak to me like that, Shane Campbell.\"\n\n\"Oh, yes, I have. Every damned right! Do you think I'd let any woman go\ncruising around the North Seas, with a crew of foreigners, and a\nshipmaster she doesn't know.... I'll bring the bi--the boat in....\"\n\n\nSection 12\n\nThey left the city of strange ugly women, with great spirit in their\nfaces, and great bearing to the body of them, and of slim cat-like men,\nwho had great power in their eyes.... A very beautiful city of churches\nand hammered brass ... a place of high rarefied thinking and savage\nanimal passion.... They left it on a July morning with the sun high....\nAnd they sailed east, sou'east down the Gulf of Finland, until Dago\nIsland was on their port quarter....\n\nAnd they rolled down the Baltic Sea, sailing sou'-sou'west, until they\npassed Gotland, and they edged west again, leaving Bornholm to port....\nAnd they sailed past Malmoe into the Sound, heading north for the\nCattegat.... They turned the Skaw and swung her into the Skage-Rack....\nAnd the wind held....\n\nAnd once out of there, they pointed her nose nor'west by nor' as though\nIceland were only a buoy in a yacht-race.... And the wind held.... The\nsummer nights of the North were on them, the unearthly beauty of the\nlight.... There was no world.... They were sailing on the Milky Way....\nOnly the gurgle of the water at the bows, the _whush_ of the wake\nbeneath the counter, held them as by a thin umbilical cord to the world\nof men.... The _whap-whap-whap_ of the cordage.... The _ting-ting-ting_\nof the helmsman's bell.... The cry for'a'd: \"The lights are burning\nbright, sir!\" ...\n\n\nSection 13\n\nThe gaunt Shetlands were on their starboard beam now, the dun Orkneys\noff the port bow. Sumburgh Head dropped away, and they headed due\nwest.... The waves were laughing, the sun rose in a great explosion\nabaft of them.... The world was a very small place.... The universe so\nlarge.... At dawn the gulls chattered and whined, and screamed until\nthey felt immense loneliness.... One seemed to be intruding in a world\nof white feathers and cold inimical eyes, and complaints in a language\none could not understand.... So lonely ... so undefiled ... the home of\nthe great whale.... Here was the world as God first made it ... clean\nand beautiful and absolute.... Up here steam engines seemed ridiculous\ntoys.... In winter the sleek seal and the great white bear.... And the\ngreat crying of the gulls.... One thought of Adelina Patti's great\nsinging and wondered did it matter a lot.\n\nAnd they swung sou'west by sou' to leave the Hebrides to port. They were\non the last leg of the voyage, and the wind still held....\n\n\"O Shane, it's wonderful....\" She had come on deck in her man's\nclothing.... She was so tall, so slim, her legs so long, it seemed some\npleasant feminine fancy of hers, not a material adaptation of the life\non board ship. \"The wind will hold until we get there.\"\n\n\"I don't like it,\" Shane grumbled.\n\n\"Why, Shane? Why don't you like it?\"\n\n\"We're too lucky.\"\n\n\"It isn't luck, Shane. It's the will of God.\"\n\n\"Hmm!\"\n\n\"Granya!\"\n\n\"Yes, Shane.\"\n\n\"I've just been thinking. Why couldn't you conspirators have chosen a\nbetter time of the year than August for landing your arms? There's only\nabout two hours of night.\"\n\n\"Because, Shane, the arms must be ready for autumn, when the harvest is\nin. That's the best time for a revolution. And the arms must be\ndistributed. And the men must drill a little. Now is our only time.\"\n\n\"Hmm.\"\n\n\"O Shane, I wish you would be a little enthusiastic.\"\n\n\"Enthusiastic? At forty-nine!\"\n\n\"Are you forty-nine, Shane? You don't seem thirty-nine. None could tell\nbut for the little gray in your hair.... And Shane....\"\n\n\"Yes!\"\n\n\"I like your hair rumpled a little with the sea-air ... much better than\nwhen it is sleek in Antrim.... Shane, you don't know how well you look\non board ship.\"\n\n\"Ooh, be damned to that.... Mr. Janseen, get them to lay aft, and see if\nyou can't get a little more out of that mizzen.... A little more pocket\nin the luff.\" ...\n\n\nSection 14\n\nThey passed the Butt of Lewis, sailing due sou'west.... To port they\nleft the Seven Hunters, changing the course to sou'west by sou'.... The\nHebrides passed them like islands in a dream, purple, gleaming strangely\nin the sunlight, now a black shower whipping over them, now sunshine\npouring in great floods.... Lewis went by, and then Harris.... North\nUist where the winds blow so hard they have an old word: _Is traugh fear\nna droiche air mhachair Uistibh_: 'Tis a pity of the slut's husband on\nthe plains of Uist.... You'll be needing buttons on your coat there....\nThey passed Rona of the Seals, and Benbecula.... They passed South Uist\nand Eriskay.... They passed the Ponboy Isles.... The islands of the Cat\nthey called them in Gaelic.... Faintly they saw the mists of Hecla ...\nheard the curlews.... They saw fishing-boats with great brown sails....\n\nHonk-honk of wild ganders in the distance, and occasionally the _chugh_\nof a diving bird.... The wind blew from the nor'west.... The foam\nsnarled beneath the bows....\n\n\"I don't like it.... I don't like it....\"\n\n\"Shane, it is wonderful.... God is with us.\"\n\n\"Hunh....\" He saw the weather leaches flick.... \"Don't let her come up,\"\nhe roared at the helmsman. \"Steer her, you Swede bastard.... Where the\nhell did you ever steer before? On a canal?\"\n\n\"Shane!\"\n\n\"What is it, Granya?\"\n\n\"Your language, Shane!\"\n\n\"Listen, Granya.... I'm not playing a comedy.... I'm sailing a ship ...\nthat's on an errand I don't like.... If you don't like my language, get\nbelow....\"\n\n\"Sorry, Shane!\" She said with a meek courtesy. She stayed....\n\nThey passed Skerryvore.... They passed Dhu Heartach, Colonsay, Islay of\nMcCrimmin.... Iristrahull was on the weather beam.... They swung\neastward.... Irishowen Head showed off the port bow.... On an August\nafternoon, they slipped into Lough Foyle....\n\n\nSection 15\n\nThe soft luminosity of a summer night was in it ... and a little moon,\nwhich Shane damned.... Before them rose the outline of Donegal.... On\neach beam they could see faintly the outlines of the bay's arms.... The\nschooner moved under jibs and mizzen.... From the bow was the splash of\nthe lead....\n\n\"By the mark, fine!\"\n\n\"Luff her a little, a little more ... steady!\"\n\n\"Four fathoms, no bottom!\"\n\n\"Keep her off a point!\"\n\n\"By the deep, four!\"\n\n\"How's the bottom?\"\n\n\"Clean and sandy, sir!\"\n\n\"No bottom at three!\"\n\n\"Ready for'a'd to let go?\"\n\n\"All ready, sir!\"\n\n\"The mark three, no bottom!\"\n\n\"Lee--o!... Hold her!\"\n\nThe long swish of oars, the rattle of oar-locks.... A voice rapping out:\n\n\"Rest on the oars!\" And then: \"Schooner ahoy!\"\n\nShane's heart sank. He gave no answer.\n\n\"What ship is that?\" The voice rang over the little bay ... found a\ngrotesque echo in some cliff....\n\n\"Who are you?\"\n\n\"His Majesty's coast-guards. Stand by. Coming aboard. Lay on your oars,\nmen!\"\n\nAnd then ... a long instant.... \"Toss oars!\"\n\n\"Bring her into the wind!\" Shane ordered....\n\nA scramble alongside, and some one was coming over the waist rail.... A\nfirm step on deck.... Some one was smiling....\n\n\"My name's Flannagan, Lieutenant Flannagan.... Sorry, Mr. Campbell, we\ncan't let you land ... your cargo or your passenger....\"\n\n\"I don't understand.\"\n\n\"Well, sir, we know what your cargo is, and my orders are not to let you\nland. And I was to tell you, sir, that you couldn't land anywhere.\"\n\n\"By God! I knew it would end like this.... Are we under arrest?\"\n\n\"No, sir.... You are just not to land. I'm sorry, sir, but.... Orders!\"\n\n\"Then what the blazes am I going to do?\"\n\n\"Jove, I don't know. Can't you bring the cargo back where you got it?\"\n\n\"I suppose I'll have to do that. But my passenger.... I can put her\nashore.\"\n\n\"I'm sorry, sir. But your passenger can't go ashore, anywhere, any time,\nin her Majesty's dominions.\"\n\n\"Hmm!\"\n\nHe heard her quick step on the companionway.\n\n\"Shane.\"\n\n\"Shane, are you there?\"\n\n\"Shane, Shane, what's wrong?\" She came into the shrouded light of the\nbinnacle. \"Shane, who--who is this?\"\n\n\"My name's Flannagan, Miss O'Malley--royal navy--I'm sorry; you can't\nland.\"\n\n\"What does it mean, Shane?\"\n\n\"You're beaten, Granya.\"\n\n\"Are we prisoners?\"\n\n\"No, Miss O'Malley, just you can't land. And I'm very distressed to tell\nyou.... You may not land anywhere, any time, in her Majesty's\ndominions.\"\n\n\"That doesn't shut out Mr. Campbell, does it?\"\n\n\"I've no orders against him, Miss O'Malley, barring his landing his\ncargo or you....\"\n\nShe laid her hand on Shane's arm....\n\n\"I'm sorry, Shane.... I'm very sorry, my dear--dear friend.... You were\nso good.... There are few--would have sacrificed their time and\nprofession, and everything--to help a woman on a wild-goose ideal!--like\nmine was.... So please forgive me!\"\n\n\"There's nothing to forgive, Granya....\"\n\n\"I want to do this ...\" she leaned forward and kissed him.... The\nlieutenant turned away. \"And now good-by.\"\n\n\"Why good-by? I'm not going ashore. I'll stick.\"\n\n\"Dear Shane, you would.\" She caught his hand, pressed, dropped it. Her\nvoice rang out: \"But I'm going ashore....\" She had swung over the\ntaffrail and dropped into the water with the soft splash of a fish....\n\n\"My God ...!\" Shane swore with rage. \"Wait. I'll get her. Will you stand\nby with your boat?\"\n\n\"Right-o!\" Flannagan answered cheerily.\n\nShane kicked off his shoes, slipped out of his coat.... \"This damned\nwoman!\" he thought as he dropped astern, came out, began to cast for\ndirection like an otter-hound.... He heard her soft rhythmical strokes\nahead.... He tore after her ... caught up ... reached her shoulder....\n\n\"Come back, Granya!\"\n\n\"No, Shane.\"\n\nHe had decided, once he reached her, to turn her back by force, but the\nstrange gentle voice restrained him. All this matter of Ireland, all\nthis expedition of opera bouffe, took on again a strange dimension when\nshe spoke.... All the time he had been foolish, he knew, and, worse,\nlooked like a fool, but some strange magic of her voice made it seem\nnatural ... the naive brave gestures.... One levitated above common\nground.... Even this moon-madness did not seem trivial and a thing for\nlaughter.... A dignity of ancient stories was on it.... The blue Irish\nhills, soft as down, the little moon, and the tide hurrying out of the\nlough to the great Atlantic.... A wrench of the will and he gripped her\nshoulder:\n\n\"Shane, please don't!\"\n\n\"You're coming back, Granya.\"\n\n\"I'm not, Shane, and please don't hold me. I'm getting weak.\"\n\n\"You'll never make it, Granya. And if you did, where would you go on the\nDonegal hills?\"\n\n\"I don't know, Shane. But please let me go, I implore you.... Even if I\ndo go down.... Don't you see? There is nothing for me but this, or\ndeath.... My life.... O Shane, let me go!\"\n\n\"Quiet, Granya!\" He caught her wrist.\n\n\"Please, Shane. Please. I pray of you....\" She began to twist.... \"O\nShane, you hurt.\"\n\n\"Quiet, Granya. Boat--o!\"\n\nThe lantern of the coast-guards' cutter came nearer.... The measured\nswish of the oars ... the creak.... She began to struggle fiercely....\n\n\"Granya, if you don't keep quiet, I'll have to hit you....\"\n\n\"O Shane!\" she whimpered....\n\n\"All right Get her on board. Steady, there. Trim a little. Good!\"\nFlannagan and a great bearded coast-guard had her.... The silence was\nbroken with her little sobs.... He helped her over the waist of the\nschooner....\n\n\"Go below, Granya, and get into some dry clothes.... Mr. Flannagan, I'll\ntake the boat back to St. Petersburg.... If Miss O'Malley doesn't land\nneither do I. May I send a letter ashore? It's only about business, and\nthe place in the glens....\"\n\n\"I'll take it and have it sent.\"\n\n\"Another thing; we want to get some provisions and water.\"\n\n\"Of course, sir.... That's all right.\"\n\n\"Do you think one of the country girls could be persuaded to come on\nboard as Miss O'Malley's maid?\"\n\n\"I think so. We'll ask the local priest.\"\n\n\"Oh, yes, the priest.... Another thing: do you think you could dig out a\nparson around here somewhere and bring him on board?\"\n\n\"O Shane, what do you want that for?\" She hadn't gone below, but waited\nin the companionway.\n\n\"You don't think you're going wandering around with me, casually, like\nthis?\"\n\n\"But it's only to St. Petersburg, Shane!\"\n\n\"And then where do you go? What do you do?\"\n\n\"I--I--I don't know.\"\n\n\"Better get the parson, Mr. Flannagan.\"\n\n\"Oh, but Shane--\" she protested.\n\n\"Go below, Granya, and get those wet things off.... And get into women's\nclothes.... Granya!\"\n\n\"Yes, Shane.... Very well, Shane....\"\n\n\n\n\nPART SEVEN\n\nTHE KINGDOM AND THE POWER AND THE GLORY\n\n\nSection 1\n\nHe felt a little ashamed, a little shy, what with his gray hairs, his\npaternity, that there should still be a thrill in his heart, a sense of\nflight in him. At fifty-eight to feel like a schoolboy going home, it\nseemed--well, not indecent, indecorous. This thing of returning to\nAntrim had been a matter of pure reason, and then suddenly his heart had\nspread forgotten wings.\n\nWithout, the sound of Broadway had changed subtly, with the coming of\nthe September dusk. The quick-pacing people had given way to the\n_clop-clop-clop_ of hansom-cabs, and the tram-cars with their tired\nhorses came less frequently now. One felt that a giant had been at work\nall day, and was now stretching himself, not lazily, but a little\nrelaxingly. Soon the great lamps would flare, and the crowds would be\ngoing to the playhouses: to Tony Pastor's to see the new play, \"Dreams,\"\nor to Harrigan & Hart's to see \"Investigation,\" or to Mr. Bartley\nCampbell's latest, \"Separation,\" at the Grand Opera-house. He would miss\nall this in Antrim, but Antrim called him.... Antrim, our mother....\n\nAnd three months ago he had never thought this possible. He had drilled\nhimself into a mature philosophy, saying: \"It doesn't matter that I\nnever see Ireland again. I am happy here with Granya and young Alan and\nRobin Beg, little Robin. All the folks are kindly and the country is a\ngreat country, and when my time comes to die there are sweet little\nplaces on Long Island where they can lay me within sound of the sea, and\nthe gentle snow will come and cover me in winter and in summer somewhere\nabout me the dogwood will blow, and the very green grass come. And\nperhaps some young children will come and play around my grave, and I\nshall hear their little gurgling laughter, sweet as the voices of\npigeons.... And one day Granya will come.... Nothing is more certain\nthan that, that Granya will come....\"\n\nBut all the philosophy in the world could not shut from his ears the\nlittle piping of Antrim. He would say: \"'Tis little thought I gave to\nAntrim and I a young man! And what is a town or so to me, who have seen\nall great cities?\" And again he said: \"Didn't you give up Antrim gladly\nwhen you got Granya? Wasn't she worth a hundred Antrims?\" And his heart\nand mind answered: \"Yes, a thousand Antrims!\" But, a very queer thing,\nthe little haunting melody of the glens would not be stilled.\n\nAnd it came to him thus: I am no longer a young man. For all I look\nforty-five, as they tell me, yet I am fifty-eight. The life of the body\nis over now. That had passed, as a mood passes. And the mind is fixed.\nIn what remains of life to me, I must think, divine, weigh. One\nprepares.... And thoughts must not be disturbed. To grow old in a city\nthat is ever young, that is in its twenties itself as it were--it makes\nan old man cold and afraid. Old buildings he has known to go down, old\nstreets are obliterated. It is a very terrible thing to be lonely when\nold, and to feel everything passes, dies.... All I have loved is thrown\naway, is of no use.... Everything old is in the way, and I am old....\nThe hawk-eyed commercial men go about so that the streets are filled\nwith them.... And all the sweet things that were said in Galilee seem\nonly a casual all-but-forgotten melody, and no revelation.... And then\ncomes a horrible memory of stark Ecclesiastes: \"The dead know not\nanything, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is\nforgotten. Also their love, and their hatred, and their envy, is now\nperished; neither have they any more a portion for ever in any thing\nthat is done under the sun.\" And old men remember the sorrowful things\nof their life, and how little happiness measured up to the misery and\ntoil of life, and they had hoped.... But there were the words of the\npreacher: \"Neither have they any more a reward\".... And secretly and\nquietly old men weep....\n\nBut to grow old with the mountains and the eternal sea, and to watch the\ndelicate bells of the heather, to know the quiet companionship of\ndogs--there is a revelation in it. No, nothing dies. And the moon rises\nand the mountains nod: Yes, I remember you when you were a schoolboy,\nrunning to be on time. And the green waves make a pleasant laughter: We\nare here. When you arise in the morning you may be certain we are here.\nThe friends of one's young days die, scatter, are lost. But the\nmountains and the water are friends forever. One can speak to them. One\ncan speak to ancient trees. And the leaves rustle....\n\nAnd Granya had sensed it.... He might have known she would. Conceal it\nas he might try, a mysterious telepathy was between them.... She\nknew....\n\nIt was she who had gone to the British embassy in Washington, telling\nShane nothing. He had heard of it afterward. She hadn't pleaded or given\nany promises. She had just flared in to the startled envoy.\n\n\"I wish to go back to Ireland.\"\n\n\"Unfortunately, the privy council had the matter of Miss O'Malley--\"\n\n\"I am not Miss O'Malley. I am Shane Campbell's wife.\"\n\n\"But you are a dangerous enemy to the empire!\"\n\n\"Am I? I had forgotten completely about the empire.\"\n\n\"There was a little matter of a shipload of rifles--\"\n\n\"And now it is a matter of a husband and two children.\"\n\n\"Sure, Miss O'Malley?\"\n\n\"I am not Miss O'Malley. I am Shane Campbell's wife. And I'm absolutely\nsure.\"\n\nIt had been so easy after all.\n\nAnd now when it was true, it was hard to credit. Within two weeks the\nship would swing to port around Donegal, and they would enter the bay\nthey had entered seven years ago, seven years and a month ago, to be\nexact. He wondered whether it would be a foggy morning, or a great\ngolden afternoon. It was a pity it had to be on board a steamship,\nthough. He would liefer have luffed in on board a boat of his own, a\ngreat suit of snowy canvas drawing joyously the Irish wind.\n\n\nSection 2\n\nUpstairs he could hear and distinguish the feet in the nursery. There\nwas the patter of little Alan's feet, and the stumble of Robin Beg's.\nThere was the shuffle of the nurse-maid, and the firm light tread of\nGranya. Soon she would come down, after the children were safely to bed,\nand little Alan's prayers were heard. And they would go out to dinner in\nNew York for the last time. It was a little pang to leave New York....\nAh, but Antrim!\n\nHe picked up his paper and read while waiting.... It was queer how he\ncould hardly focus his attention on it, impatient for her as a schoolboy\nfor his first love.... Always when she entered a room came beauty....\nWell, she would come.... The type took form beneath his eyes.... The\nraces at Sheepshead Bay: Tom Martin had captured the Twin City\nHandicap.... In Ireland they would go to the Curragh and Baldoyle to\nsee the horses, and the Dublin horse-show, and the hunts on a frosty\nmorning.... What was this? Heavy bets laid that Cleveland would be next\nPresident. The Irish wouldn't like that. They were all for Blaine. It\nwas only the other night that Mrs. Delia Parnell, Parnell's mother, had\nattended the great Irish rally in the Academy of Music.... That was a\nmistake, mixing up Irish politics with American statesmanship. There\nwould be folk to resent that, and rightly, too.... Too much talk of\ndynamite, and that horrible thing in Phoenix Park.... What an\ninvolved, emotional affair all this Irish matter was!... To understand\nIreland one must understand Irishmen, that either hatred or love rule\nthem.... Parnell, though, looked hopeful. No emotion, all brains and\nwill.... He could not be side-tracked by preferment, or religion, or\nlove for women. There was a man whose head was firm on his shoulders; he\nwould never be wrecked.... Ah, here was something Granya would be glad\nto hear: Margaret Mather got a splendid reception in Pittsburg with her\n_Lady Macbeth_.... Whew! Cholera at Naples. That was serious! Not an\nover-clean people, the Italians.... Li Hung Chang degraded of his\ntitles. Who the blazes was Li Hung Chang anyway, and what titles did he\nhave?... And Major Kitchener disperses the Berber tribes.... How\nunimportant! Ah, here was something. Great gambling reported on the\n_City of Rome_. Ah, there was what he always contended, that steam would\nruin everything. The great sea a resort for gamblers! In the old days,\nin sail, when a captain was a captain, he'd have had none of that on\nboard clean timbers.... He was a little afraid the world was going to\nthe dogs!\n\nOch! Was that woman never coming down at all, at all?\n\nHe smiled to himself at how the Ulster speech came back to him at the\nthought of Ulster.... He turned to the paper with an effort of will....\nAn Indian outbreak feared in western Montana.... Stanley going to\nEgypt.... Policeman beaten up in Brooklyn; a tough place, Brooklyn!...\nAmerican schooner arrested by Russian corvette for selling rum to Bering\nStrait natives: a very strict modern people, the Russians.... Picnics on\nStaten Island blamed for ruin of young girls.... And Bismarck and the\npope still sparring. Did that poor German think he could ever get the\nbetter of the subtle Romans ...? Och, what was keeping that woman?\n\nThe light had become so dim that he could hardly read. The tempo\nwithout quickened. People were hurrying now, on their way to the\nrestaurants for the evening meal. From the restaurants to the theater.\nHome to sleep. And a new day with the old work facing them. There was a\nfascination, a hypnosis to New York. He felt a pang at leaving it. It\nhad been very friendly to him. And he would never see it again.... Ah,\nbut he would remember it!\n\n\nSection 3\n\nIt came to him with a sense of revelation that all his life he had been\nlooking forward: always the new thing. And now he would be looking back.\nAlways before guessing. Looking back now, knowing, or not quite knowing,\nbut having before him material from which to draw wisdom, truth. All his\nlife it seemed he had been gathering something. Now was the time to sort\nit, make it.... And then, what was he to do with whatever he had made?\nToward what end? The paper he had in his hands dropped to his knees. His\neyes fixed on the windows where the lights of the city began to shine,\nsaw a haze, saw nothing. His ears, listening to the _clop-clop-clop_ of\nthe hansoms, heard only rhythm, then a faint harmony, then nothing....\nHimself, within him, seemed to see old scenes, to be in old scenes. The\nlittle boy going down to the sea in ships, seeking an island he had seen\nin a mirage ... a mood of wonder.... There were feet, there was the\nworld. Every tree was an emerald miracle, every house a mystery, all\npeople were riddles.... Come, little boy, come and look! The instinct of\nthe salmon for the sea. The river where he was spawned hurries to the\nsea, and his instinct is to go with it, not against it.... It deepens\nand broadens, and ahead is always a clearer pool, a more shadowy rock, a\nsofter water-fern. It is pleasant to swim under the sallow-branches, and\nrapids whip.... And there is the lull of an estuary, and the\n_chush-chush_ of little waves, and he is in the sea.... And now he must\nlay his own course.... The lure of the river has brought him so far.\n\nAnd Shane thought: I was born a salmon in a river. The stupid pretty\ntrout remained in the river, and the secretive eels.... And the perch\nand the roach and the ponderous bream, and the pike that is long of\nsnout, they remained by the grassy waters.... But those that are born\nsalmon must go down to the sea....\n\nA little shadow came into his face, and his breath was caught sharp. He\nwas remembering Moyra, the wife he had, and he no older than a boy....\nLike some strange fascination, ugly dream that came to him.... And\nqueerly enough, the picture of Moyra's mother, the old wife of Louth,\nwas clearer in his mind than his wife.... Moyra was like some troubled\ncloud, a thing that blotted out sunshine for a while, through no fault\nof its own, but the mother was sinister. An old woman keening, and the\nbreath of whisky on her, and her eyes sobering in a bitter greed.... Why\nshould Moyra have died? Fate: the act of God: whatever you care to call\nit. Why should he have been dragged into it, Shane wondered. If he\nhadn't, what would have happened? He didn't know. But he knew this, that\nin the marriage to Moyra he had been gripped by the shoulder, and looked\nin the eyes, and a voice had said: \"Wait. All is not wonder and mystery.\nLife is not a child's toy. You must learn.\"\n\nPoor Moyra, he could hardly remember anything but her pleading,\nhalf-inimical eyes, her mouth that twisted easily to anger, her shame\nthat her hands and feet were uncouth. And now she had loved him. And now\nhated him. He remembered one May evening when suddenly she had caught\nhis hand and kissed it, and pressed it to her heart. And later that\nnight she had cursed bitterly at him, saying black was the day she had\nset eyes on him, and black the day she married him, and her face was\ntwisted into agonized ugliness. And when he went to sea a few days later\nhe had found a symbol of her religion, an _Agnus Dei_, sewed into his\ncoat to protect him against the terrors of the deep waters.\n\nAnd she had died, poor tortured Moyra, suddenly. Why? Had What had\nfashioned her thought: That's not rightly done? No. That's poor. Wait.\nI'll do it over....\n\nAh, well, God give her peace, wherever she wandered! How many years had\nit taken to get over, not her death, but their being married? A long\ntime. Seven bitter years. He might have turned into a bitter, fierce old\nman, hating all things. The whole thing had been like a cruelty to a\nhappy wondering child. And he had closed his heart, resentful,\nafraid.... And then had come Claire-Anne.\n\nOnce he had been a child with wondering gray eyes, and life had made him\nblind as a mole, secretive as a badger, timid of the world as the owl is\ntimid of daylight. The shock of Claire-Anne, and he was cognizant of\ngreat enveloping currents of life. Wonder he had known, and bitterness\nhe had known, but the immense forces that wind the stars as a clock is\nwound he had not known.... And with Claire-Anne they had burst about him\nlike thunder. They had played around him as the corposant flickers\naround the mast-head of a ship.... Poor Claire-Anne! The miracle of her.\nShe was like some flowering bush in an arctic waste.... Her wonderful\nscared eyes, her tortured self.... It was a very strange thing that her\nend did not bother him.... A gesture of youth, that sudden snap of the\nwrist with the poor dead prince's dagger.... He had been very honest\nabout it, and it did not bother him, any more than it would have been on\nhis conscience to have shot a crippled horse.... Once it had seemed to\nhim unnecessarily histrionic, but now he knew it was merciful.... Her\nspirit had gone too far ever to return to normal life....\n\nBut the little woman of the East, that did bother him. In boyhood he had\nknown the wonder of life. In youth he had known there existed sordid\ntragedy. In young manhood passion had crashed like lightning.... And\nthen he had thought he knew all. He had considered himself the master of\nlife and said: \"I will do such and such a thing and be happy. Enjoy\nthis, because I know how to enjoy it. To the wise man, all is a\npleasant hedonism.\" It struck, him at the time how terribly foolish and\npiteous great men were.... Jesus dead on a crucifix; Socrates and the\nhemlock bowl; the earnest Paul beheaded at Rome.... A little wisdom, a\nlittle callousness would have avoided all this.... How satisfied he was,\nhow damned petty! His little bourgeois life, his harem of one pretty\ngirl, his nice ship ... smug as a shop-keeper ... and then life, fate,\nwhatever you call it, had tripped him up, abashed, beaten, through the\nmedium of a mountebank wrestler whom he had conquered in a street\nbrawl....\n\n[Illustration]\n\nAnd after seven years of blackness, and despair. The long reach to\nBuenos Aires, and the querulous sea-birds mocking him: On the land is\ndesolation and pettiness and disappointment.... And what is there on the\nsea? The great whale is dying; the monster who ranged the deep must go\nbecause men must have oil to cast up their accounts by the light of it,\nand women must have whalebone for stays.... The sleek seal with brown\ngentle eyes must die that harlots shall wear furs.... And there never\nwas a Neptune or a Mannanan mac Lir.... There were only stories from a\nfoolish old book.... The sun shines for a moment on the green waters,\nand your heart rises.... But remember the blackness of the typhoon,\nand how the cold left-hand wind rages round the Horn.... And the coral\nislands have great reefs like knives, and the golden tropics lure to\nblack lethal snakes.... Fool! Fool! We have ranged the clouds, and there\nis no good-willing God.... There is only coldness and malignant\nthings.... So cried the querulous sea voices, and they tempted him: \"All\nyou have known is desolation and vanity. Better to have died a boy while\nthe meadows they were green.... All before you is emptiness,\" they\nmocked. And they came nearer: \"Behold, the night is black, the ocean is\nof great depth, immeasurable, the ship plows onward under a quartering\nbreeze. A little step, a little step leeward, a vault over the taffrail\nas over a little ditch, and there will be peace and rest. Look at the\nwater flow past. No problems there.... God! how close he had been to it,\nin the seven black years, the long voyage from Liverpool, and the sordid\ntown at the end.... How close! And then Alan Donn, God rest him! had\ndied, and he had gone back to Ireland, and met Granya, and been foolish\nas a boy in his teens. A shipload of rifles to free Ireland! What a\ndamned fool he had felt when they had simply shooed him away!\"\n\nHe thought to himself with a little smile that out of the wisdom of his\nlife had always come sorrow, and out of his foolishness had come joy....\nGranya, and peace, and meaning to his life.... A very foolish thing it\nhad been, that expedition.... But he wouldn't have it laughed at, nor\nlaugh at it himself.... Over the mists of the past the thing took\nglamour.... He had been more moved than he had allowed himself to\nbelieve then. And here in his New York drawing-room, remembering the old\nheroic-comic gesture, and remembering tragedies of material that were\nglorification of spirit, he thought for an instant he had solved the\nmystery of Ireland, ... Ireland was a drug.... Out of the gray sweeping\nstones, and the bogs of red moss and purple water, and from the proud\nbrooding mountains, and the fields green as a green banner, there\nexhaled some subtle thing that made men lose sense of worldly\nproportion.... It was in their mothers' milk, a subtle poison. It crept\ninto their veins, and though they might leave Ireland, yet for\ngenerations would it persist.... It gave them the gift of laughter, and\ncontempt for physical pain, and an egregious sensitiveness.... So that\nthe world wondered ... their wars were merry wars, and their poetry\nsobbed, like a bereaved woman.... They threw their lives away\nrecklessly, and a phrase meant much to them.... Perhaps they knew that\naction counted nothing, and emotion all.... Ah, there he was losing\nhimself!\n\nAt any rate, Ulster Scot though he was, he didn't regret it--apart even\nfrom its bringing him Granya. Perhaps at the news of it, some hard\nEnglish official might feel a twitch at his heart-strings, and\nremembering that the Irish were as little children, be kind to some\nreprobate Celt.... An action had so many antennae. One never knew where\nits effects stopped, if ever....\n\nA foolish thing that had brought him joy where wisdom brought him\nsorrow! Strange. Until then he had been existent, sentient, but never\nuntil then alive. Wonder, disillusionment, passion, tragedy, despair. In\neach of these moods he had had a glimpse, now and then, of an immense\nuniversal design, as a bird may have it, and its throat quivering with\nsong, or as a salmon may have it, and he flinging himself tremendously\nover a weir. He knew it, as a tree knows when the gentle rains of April\ncome. But that he existed, as an entity apart from trees, from salmon,\nand from birds, he had not known until Granya, broken, had crept weeping\ninto his arms....\n\n\"Give me strength, Shane, for God's sake. Give me strength, or I die!\"\n\nAnd somewhere, out of something, some esoteric, where he had plucked\nstrength and given it to her, and he knew it wasn't from his body, or\nfrom his mind, or his spirit even, he had given it. He had, from some\ntremendous storehouse, got life for her, got peace, so that she\nfluttered like a pigeon and sighed and grew calm.... And in that moment\nhe knew he was alive.\n\nHe tried to figure it to himself in terms of concrete things, and he\nsaid: \"If I were a racing-boat now, I would decide how to make a certain\nbuoy, and my mind would figure how to get there, what tack to make, the\nexact moment of breaking out the spinnaker rounding the mark. Perhaps my\nmind is nothing, something I use just now, as I use my body. For the\nhand on the rudder is not I. It is something I am using to hold that\nrudder. As I might lash it with a rope, if I were so minded. And my eyes\nare just something I use. They are just like the indicators on the\nstays; they and the indicators are one, to tell me how the wind shifts.\nAll that is not I. It is something I use. Perhaps even my mind is\nsomething I use, as I use my hands. But somewhere, somewhere within me,\nis I.\"\n\nAnd a great sense of exaltation and wonder and dignity swept through\nevery fiber of him at the thought of this: new-born he was, clean as a\ntrout, naked as a knife, strong as the sea. He was one of the lords of\nthe kindly trees, masters of the pretty flowers: the little animals of\nGod were given him, it being known he would not abuse the gift.... And\nthough lightning should strike him yet he would not die, but put off his\nbody like a rent garment.... And though he were to meet the savage bear\nin the forest, and have no means of conquering it, yet were he to become\naware of this entity of life in him, he would smile at the thought of\nphysical danger, and the great furry thing would recognize that dignity\nand be abashed.... And there was no more wonder, or mystery, or fear,\nonly beauty.... The moon was not any more a mystery, but a place to be\ntrodden one day, were his place to be there.... And the furthest star\nwas no further than the further island on terrestrial seas; one day he\nwould reach that star, somehow, as now he could the furthest island with\nhead and hand.... Though death should smite his body he would not die.\n\n\nSection 4\n\nA strange thing was this, that Granya had always known this life. It was\nso certain to her that it was no more a wonder than rain is, or\nsunshine, or the rising of the moon....\n\nHe had spoken of it to her one evening in the dusk. She had smiled, her\ngrave beautiful smile.\n\n\"Of course I know, Shane. I always knew.\"\n\n\"But how did you know, Granya?\"\n\n\"I think,\" she said, \"I think all good women know, Shane. Men are so\ncomplete, so welded. Mind and body seem to be themselves; the body and\nmind function so that one doesn't see that there is anything within that\ndirects them. They are compact. But a woman is diffuse, Shane. Her mind\nis not a man's mind; it is a thing she can use when she wants to and\nthen forget.... When women sit and think, you know, they aren't\nthinking. They are feeling, Shane. It comes like a little wind. There\nmay be a place by the sea-shore, sparse heather and sandy dunes, and the\nlittle waves come chiming, and the curlew calls. And you sit. And a very\nstrange peace comes to you, so that in a low soft voice you sing a verse\nof song.... Or it may come on the cold winds of winter, through the\nascetic trees.... But women are always cognizant of God.... Even bad\nwomen, Shane, who mistake the Unknown God for the true.... And a woman\nis very much apart from her body. It is just a nuisance at times, or at\ntimes a thing of beauty, or at times a thing one expresses something\nwith, something that is too deep for words, as with a violin. And to\nsome it is a curse.... But a body is always apart from one, and a mind\nis, too.... Shane, you have seen very beautiful old women.... Women with\na beauty that is like a flame that does not burn, that have a light\nwithin them somewhere ... that is not of the mind or of the body ...\nthat is of these things worn thin so that they themselves show.... See,\nheart?\"\n\n\"But Granya, why must a man find out, and a woman know?\"\n\n\"Shane of my heart, because it is necessary to women that they may live.\nA man can live without knowing God, as blind men live without ever\nseeing the moon. For they have minds, Shane, pursuits--the amassing of\nmoney, the little light of fame, that is only a vanity--not real.... But\nShane, no matter how hard a man has to work, a woman has more terrible\nthings.... There is no man on earth can understand the bearing of\nchildren.... And there is no man, were he to think of it, try to know,\nbut would rather die than submit to what he thinks that terror.... And\nyet, Shane, it is not so much.... After a little agony, when one goes\ninto the dark, olive valley, and strength seems to go from you in great\nwaves, until you are robbed of strength as a man may be robbed of\nblood.... Then one goes out of one's self and gets it.... The beauty in\nthe face of young mothers, of brides. That is not body or mind, Shane,\nthat is their selves. This was the Eleusinian mystery, Shane, that women\nknow that God lives, and that they cannot die....\n\n\"See, Shane, the stars are out. The dew is falling. And on the morrow\nyou must be afoot early. Shall we go in?\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nOnce, before Alan Oge was born, a wave of panic swept over him, and he\ncaught her hand and looked at her:\n\n\"What is it, Shane?\"\n\n\"If--if you should die--\"\n\n\"I shall not die, Shane. I know. I shall not die.\"\n\n\"But how do you know?\"\n\n\"I just know, Shane. That's all.\"\n\n\"O Granya, it seems very terrible, that one day one of us should die.\"\n\n\"Dear Shane, it is not very terrible. If I should die, my heart, I\nshould know I would not have long to wait. And I should be with you,\nShane, even dead, when I could.... And after days of trouble suddenly\none morning you would know you had had a good night's sleep, and that\nwould be because I had come to you in the night and had kissed you, and\nlaid a dim hand on you.... And sometimes, in difficulties, you would\nfeel a sudden rush of strength, and that would be because I was beside\nyou ... dear heart, dear Shane.\"\n\n\"I am so much older, Granya. I shall be the first to die.\"\n\n\"If you are the first to go, Shane, I shall be like some wife of the\nCrusades, of an old time when a dream meant more than a pocketful of\nmoney ... and men were glad to go, and women glad to send them. I shall\nsit by my fire, and when you come I shall talk to you in my heart ...\nsaying little foolish sweet things.... And when I need you, I shall go\nout into the soft night, and call, and you will hear my voice in the\nMilky Way ... and God will let you come ... my darling....\"\n\n\"Granya!\"\n\n\"And maybe--sweet, sweet thought--He will let us go together....\"\n\n\nSection 5\n\nHere was a great fact, that he lived, but with the fact came a problem:\nWhy? If within him there existed this sentient, supple, strong thing,\nand it did exist, for what end was it designed? It was not enough to\nhave faith, to know one lived to save one's soul.... That was selfish,\nand selfishness was an unpardonable thing, the sin against the Holy\nSpirit. That has ordained there should be one occult purpose.... No,\neverything had a reason.... The sheltering trees, the ocean from whose\nwomb came the great clouds that nurtured the green grass: the winds that\nwere like gigantic brooms. The wise and the good labored, and never\nshirked.... Each man must give according to his station, the strong man\nof strength, the wise one of wisdom; the one who knew beauty must give\nit somehow, not huddle it like a miser's hoard.... All men must work;\nthat was as natural an instinct as the law that men must eat: and work\ndid not mean grinding, but justifying one's existence fully.... None may\nhold back, for that is ignoble, and all that is ignoble dies, dies and\nis used again.... The murderer's dead body may nurture a green bay-tree,\nsuch beautiful economy nature has.... And it seemed to him that the\nsouls of dark men were used, too, but used as negations, and that was\ndeath.... Perhaps they provided the sinister thunderstorms, the terrible\ntyphoon, the cold polar breezes, the storms off the Horn.... They might\nbe the counterpoint of nature's harmony.... But this was going past\nknowledge, and past knowledge of heart and head one must not go.... But\nof one thing he was certain; all that is ignoble dies....\n\nHe had always known from the time he was a young boy that man must do\nsomething.... It was not sufficient to make a little money and sit down\nand spend it, as a dog finds a bone and gnaws it, or buries it, in a\nsolitary place.... For a long time he had thought it sufficient to do\nthe little commerce of the world.... But that was not sufficient.... In\nBuenos Aires he had felt ridiculous, as a giant might feel ridiculous\ncarrying little stones for the making of a grocer's house.... Ashamed, a\nlittle resentful! He was like a dumb paralytic with flaming words in his\nheart and brain, and he could not write them, not even speak them\naloud....\n\nBut all his life this had worried him, the getting of work to do. And\nwhen he came to America with Granya he had come with great plans. Ships\nand ship-building were the only things he knew, and he had thought with\nothers that the great clipper days might be revived. Iron steamships\nwere grasping the swift commerce of the world, but there were errands\ngreat wooden ships under skysails might yet be supreme in, the grain\ntrade of San Francisco, for instance. And it might be possible, so he\nhad dreamed, that once more the great pre-war clippers should be the\npride of the new idealistic commonwealth ... and what had come from his\nhand? A half-dozen three-masted schooners, and not very good schooners\neither, being too long in the hull for strength.... And nobody seemed to\ncare.... From Belfast and the Clyde, iron boats swarmed like flies....\nAnd people were impatient.... They did not care to wait if a ship were\nblown from her course.... They wanted ships on time.... People had\nlaughed at him, calling him crazy, and saying he was trying to stem\nprogress.... And then they had done worse.... They had smiled and said\nit was a hobby of his.... He knew it was no use. He quit.... And Granya\nhad been very tender.\n\n\"You mustn't mind, Shane. It was very lovely of you to dream and act....\nBut it is not intended. Don't take it to heart, dearest.\"\n\n\"All my life, Granya, I have been trying to do something, and I always\nfail.\"\n\n\"Dear Shane, you never fail. The success is in yourself, not outside of\nyourself. That is all.\"\n\n\"Ah, yes, Granya, but that is not enough. That seems so selfish. So many\nmen have done so much for the world, and I have done nothing. Even the\nold charwoman on her knees scrubbing floors has done more. She has given\nher best, and her best has been useful.\"\n\n\"But, Shane, you must wait. Have patience.\"\n\n\"I am old, Granya, and have done nothing.\"\n\n\"Wait, Shane, wait. I am going to dim the light, and blur all these\nthings around us, and tell you a secret thought has been deep in my\nheart for years. There will be we two just in the room--absolute. And\ncome nearer the fire, dear Shane, where I can just see where your hand\nis, and put my hand on it when the thought makes me feel like a child in\na great wood.... Shane....\n\n\"You know your charts, the charts you use and you at sea, the charts of\nthe heavens, where what stars we know are marked, the sun and the moon\nand Venus and Jupiter, and Sirius the dog star, and Saturn, and the star\nyou steer your ship by, the polar star.... And all the constellations,\nthe Milky Way, and the belt of Orion, and the Plow and the Great Bear\nand the great glory you see when you pass the line, the Southern Cross\n... and the little stars you have no names for, but mark them on your\nchart with quaint Greek letters.... Our little world is so little, so\npathetically little in this immensity.... It is as though we were living\non the smallest of islands, like some of the islands you have known and\nyou on board ship following the moon down the West--Saba, where the\nDutch are in the Caribbean, or Grenada, the very little island.... And\non that island they know only vaguely that such great lands as Africa\nand Europe and Asia are.... They don't know it from experience.... But\nPeking of the bells exists, and stately Madrid, and Paris that is a\nblaze of light, and London where the fog rolls inland from the sea....\nHeart of my heart, how terrible it is that cannot, will not see,\nunderstand.... And they say: Well, we don't see it. Here we were born\nand here we die.... And they say: Show us somebody who has been\nthere.... They forget how long is the journey and how a man may have\naffairs in the crowning cities.... Dearest, I am losing myself, but I\nknow.\n\n\"And this is what I want to tell you, Shane, that when you die--oh,\nsuch an ugly word that is, Shane, for the bud bursting into flower--when\nit is your time to leave here, Shane, there will be a place for you, not\nidleness at all.... All the stars, Shane, the valleys of the moon....\nThere is work, Shane dear. Nothing is perfect, else there should be no\nreason for life. There must be stars that are old, as Dublin is old, and\nneed vitality.... There must be stars that are young and cruel, as this\ncity is young and cruel, and need sweet strength.... But I am very\npresumptuous, Shane, to try and fathom the Great Master's plan.... It is\nso colorless--oh, there is no word or symbol for it, Shane.... But there\nis a Great Master and there is a Plan....\n\n\"Heart, I tell you this, showing all my weakness of thought. You know it\nis the truth, too.... But I tell you I know, so that our two selves'\nknowing may make it a little stronger in us....\n\n\"O Shane, I have no logic, but I know.... And all the logicians in the\nworld could not shame me to myself. All the reason in the world could\nnot shake me. It would be artillery shot against the wind.... A star is\na promise to me, Shane, and the wind a token, and the new moon just a\npleasant occurrence, like the coming of spring....\n\n\"Shane, I know all this. I know it not for myself but for you.... I\nknow three things: I know God lives, I know I love you, I know we shall\nnot die.... I love you, Shane, and there is no shame on me telling it to\nyou, for you are as my heart and I am as yours.... When I see you at\ntimes there comes over me a sweetness from head to foot, and at times\nwhen I see you, a great dignity comes to me, because you love me, and\nyour love is good.... I know there is a place in the coming days, and I\nknow I shall be with you, wherever you go....\n\n\"Here in this dim room, Shane, I know these things. Outside is the\nworld, that is forgetting or that doesn't care, or will not see. Here in\nthis dim room, with the red of the fire turning to a gentle yellow, I\nknow it better than the people in churches, that kindly God lives, that\nI love you, Shane, and that we shall not die....\"\n\n\nSection 6\n\nIt seemed to him that he must have been in reverie for ages, so much had\nhe thought sitting there, so much felt.... He had been like a gull\npoised on the wing, and now he dropped gently to the calm waters.... New\nYork to-day, and in two weeks Antrim, and then a rest.... And then\nwider spaces than he had ever known, greater adventure.... A day would\ncome when he would be called, as though some one had said: Shane\nCampbell! and then a gesture that made a horse stumble, or a flaw of\nwind that would turn over a boat.... Click!...\n\nAnd it seemed to him that it would be not only sweeter, but wiser to die\nin Antrim.... New York was no place for a man like him to die. For an\nold man, weary with life's work, there would be gentle hands, and soft\ncaring, and guidance for tired eyes.... But for a man young spiritually,\nstrong, there would be no coddling.... He would be expected to jump\nforward at the call.... And to go through the maze of smoke and dust,\nand the evil jungles of the air one sensed in a great city would\nbe--waste of time and energy.... In Antrim when the call would come\nthere would be the clear high air, the friendly glens, the great\nencouraging mountains, and the Moyle laughing in the moonlight: Don't be\nembarrassed! Don't be afraid!\n\nAbove, he heard a door shut. There was no longer the patter of the boys'\nfeet on the floor, nor the drag of the maid's shoes, but Granya's firm\nlight step he could sense somehow, and then came a little sound to him,\nthat he knew was her dropping to her knees by Alan Beg's bed, while she\nrecited for him, taught him, the great prayer.... Shane bowed his head\nin reverence.... He could see the dim beauty of her face, her great\ntrusting eyes, her sweet hands.... Almost could he hear her voice, so\nclose was she in his heart....\n\n\nSection 7\n\n\"Our Father, ...\"\n\nHe could see the symbols that were in her mind, because they were in his\ntoo, the gentle pictures that translated the thought these words evoked:\nthe great majestic figure with the strong hands and gentle eyes, the\neyes that smiled when colts gamboled, or a rabbit flashed across the\ngrass, that loved the beauty of the garden when He walked in it at the\nclose of day. One felt Him now and then as He went through His smallest\nworld, perhaps in the evening when the crickets sang, perhaps over the\nmoonlit waters, or with the little winds of dawn.... Such strength and\nkindliness, and the majestic eyes were troubled; for, sympathetic toward\nthe wayward, the bothered, the weak.... They only hardened with the\npromise of terror for the hypocrite, the traitor, for those who devoured\nwidows' houses....\n\n\"Who art in heaven, ...\"\n\nHe smiled to himself at the thought of heaven. There was where one's\nfancy was free, to realize all the sweet desires of what was good in\none.... To those who deserved it God would not begrudge His heaven.... A\nquiet place, Shane thought, a hushed place, a place of rest.... Whither\none might go to realize again all the beauty one had ever known.... All\nthat one had held sweet and wonderful would be there--they had not\ndied.... A white magic would bring back the laughter of babies, and\nkisses gently given ... and all estrangements of friends and lovers\nwould be eased there, and they would be brought together in a magical\ntrysting-place, and there would be no unharmony.... All the horses one\nhad ever loved would take shape in the air, with necks stretched and\nwhinnying recognition.... All the great ships one had wondered at would\nappear when called, their spread of snowy canvas, their tapering\nspars.... All the dogs one had had would be there ... their yelps of\njoy, their sweet brown eyes, their ears up, their tails wagging ... all\nthe dogs would be there!\n\n\"Hallowed be Thy name ...\"\n\nThe head must bow there. The name evoked a thought, and the thought was\nineffable, such glory and sweetness and strength it had.... Names\nbrought pictures. When the word \"Helen\" was uttered, one saw the burned\ntowers of Troy.... And \"Venice,\" massive shadows and great moonlit\nwaters.... And Genghis Khan brought the riot of galloping horses and the\nTartar blades a-flash.... Such power great words had, and this was the\ngreatest word, so great as to be terrible, and not to be mentioned by\npetty men, who cheapen with their grudging tongues.... No picture there,\nbut some great anthem of the stars.... Not as yet could our ears hear\nit.... Nor would they ever hear it, if we had not reverence.\n\n\"Thy kingdom come ...\"\n\nSome immense plan existed, which human mind could never see. No\npractical wisdom could ever grasp. Were all the sum of practical wisdom\ngathered in a little room, and infused with spirit until it burst the\nfour walls of the world, yet it might not grasp it.... Yet all things\nworked that this plan should come to fruition. The stars rolled in their\ncourses. The great winds came. There fell the rain of April and the soft\nDecember snow.... And the kingdom was a good kingdom, for nothing evil\nconquered ever.... It died and was eliminated, and when it was all as\nnothing then might the kingdom come ... no arbitrary blowing of\nGabriel's trumpet, but that foremost sweetness that comes from the west\nwind....\n\n\"Thy will be done on earth ...\"\n\nIt was always done on earth, but the ignoble, the inglorious, the small\nput their petty obstacles in its way, and delayed the coming of the\nkingdom.... Men grew engrossed in their affairs, grew self-sufficient. A\nlittle money in their pockets, and God was forgotten. A little more and\nthey despised their fellow-men, and hatred arose. And evil wars came,\nand years were lost.... Cunning men put the emotions, the ideals, the\nactions of glorious men up for barter.... And the men who were tricked\nbrooded.... And the cunning men took the land and the waters and the\nlight, and worked tortuously until they could sell them at a price....\nAnd the things God had made for his people were the means to procure\nthese dark folk wine and mistresses and the state of kings.... Such was\nnot the doing of the Will.... But one day it would be worked out by men\nhow these things could not ever again be.... The slow certain coming of\nthe kingdom....\n\n\"As it is in heaven ...\"\n\nFrom the green resting-place came all that was sweet and harmonious, the\nshape of clouds, the high spirit of horses, the loyalty of dogs, the\ngraceful movement swans have, and the song of the lesser birds. From\nthat green resting-place came the gold of the gorse, and the sweet line\nof trees, and the purple the heather has--the loved heather. Thence came\nthe word that set the friendly moon on high, and put out the white\nbeauty of the young and alternated sunshine with the rains of spring.\nAll was done there according to wisdom and beauty.\n\n\"Give us this day our daily bread ...\"\n\nThat was no whine for the prisoner's dole. That was the simplicity of\nasking that the moon and the sun still rise. Give beauty to women, and\ngrace to children, and songs for poets to sing. Let not the green tree\nwither, but send it rain. And give a little softness to the hearts of\ncallous men. And remind us that widows live, and that there are\nfatherless. Teach us how to heal sickly children, and be easy on horses.\nAnd give us gentleness. And when roses grow on the walls in June, put a\nbud in our hearts....\n\n\"And forgive us our trespasses ...\"\n\nThe picture that came into Shane's mind then was not the picture of an\nabased man beating his breast, but the thought of a mature man clanging\nthrough the halls of heaven past every guard until he came where wisdom\nand beauty was, and standing and throwing back his head: \"I have done\nwrong,\" he would say, \"rotten wrong, and I'm wretched about it.\" And\nthere would be an answer: \"You did right to come.\"\n\n\"As we forgive those who trespass against us ...\"\n\nAh! That was hard! That was the most difficult thing in the world, the\nCelt in Shane knew. The horripilation of the skin, the twitching\nnostrils, the feeling for the knife in the armpit.... When one was\nyoung, the careless word, the savage blow, the brooding feud.... But men\ngrew better with the increase of the years, and with maturity came the\nsense that not every one could insult or hurt a man. The jibes and\ntrespasses of petty people meant so little, and one sensed the Destiny,\nthe strange veiled One, balanced in His own wise time the evil done a\nman with unexpected good.... One grew wiser even yet with the years and\nknew that a great wrong was outside one's personal jurisdiction.... One\nhad to leave that to the broad justice of the High God.... One could\nappeal there, as with the old _cri de haro_ of Norman low.... _Haro!\nharo! A l'aide, mon prince. On me fait tort!_ Hither! Hither! Help me,\nmy king; one dropped on one's knees in the market-place: I am being\ninjured overmuch! And it was the prince's duty to help feal men.... To\nforgive trespasses--only one understood in maturity, one grew to it....\nThe strong and wise were the meek, not the weaklings ... the men who\nknew that justice was absolute ... the men with the calm eyes and the\ngrim smile, they were the terrible meek....\n\n\"And lead us not into temptation ...\"\n\nA little cry of humility that was, a very human reminder to the Only\nPerfect One that we in this very small world were weak. Work we had to\ndo, destinies to fulfil, but under weakness, or from false strength, one\nmight wander from our appointed path.... The power of office, let it\nbreed arrogance ... the sense of money, let it not bring smug\ncallousness.... And the singers of the world be proud only of the trust,\nbut humble in themselves as the birds are among the trees.... And let\nnot strength have contempt, but gentleness....\n\n\"But deliver us from all evil ...\"\n\nThere were dark places in the world, and one needed guidance there,\nprotection.... From Satan, who is not a spirit, but a horrible miasma,\nthat floats in little vapors here and there, when the clean winds are\nresting ... from the warm inviting and evil jungle where one might seek\nrelief in distress, or having been over-long in the high air ... from\nthe twisted souls of dark men and women who seek to sully as with\nwrithing piteous hands ... from deep sinister pools we know are thick\nwith horror but feel charmed toward, as one feels like plunging to death\nfrom the summit of some building terribly high.... From these, Lord God,\ndeliver us!\n\n\"For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory,\n\n\"For ever and ever.\"\n\n+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+\n|Transcriber's note: The 'o' in 'Froken' has a circle over it. It is not|\n|represented in this text.                                              |\n+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+","title":"The Wind Bloweth","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":78176}