_ PART VI. MAN AND GOD
CHAPTER VI
With two of his cronies the man had spent the day in a room overlooking the harbour, drinking hard and playing billiards. Early in the afternoon a messenger had come from Ballawhaine, saying, "Your father is ill--come home immediately." "By-and-bye," he had said, and gone on with the game.
Later in the afternoon the messenger had come again, saying, "Your father has had a stroke of paralysis, and he is calling for you." "Let me finish the break first," he had replied.
In the evening the messenger had come a third time, saying, "Your father is unconscious." "Where's the hurry, then?" he had answered, and he sang a stave of the "Miller's Daughter"--
"They married me against my will,
When I was daughter at the mill."
Finally, Caesar, who had been remonstrating with the Ballawhaine at the moment of his attack, came to remonstrate with Ross, and to pay off a score of his own as well.
"Honour thy father and thy mother, that thy days----" cried Caesar, with uplifted arm and the high pitch of the preacher. "But your days will not be long, anyway, and, if you are the death of that foolish ould man, it won't be the first death you're answerable for."
"So you believe it, too?" said Ross, cue in hand. "You believe your daughter is dead, do you, old Jephthah Jeremiah? Would you be surprised to hear, now----" (the cronies giggled) "that she isn't dead at all?----Good shotr-cannon off the cushion. Halloa! Jephthah Jeremiah has seen a ghost seemingly. Saw her myself, man, when I was up in town a month ago. Want to know where she is? Shall I tell you? Oh, you're a beauty! You're a pattern! You know how to train up a child in the way----Pocket off the red----It's you to preach at my father, isn't it? She's on the streets of London--ah, Jeremiah's gone----
'They married me against my will '--
There you are, then--good shot--love--twenty-five and nothing left."
Pete pushed through to the billiard-room. Fearing there might be violence, hoping there would be, yet thinking it scarcely proper to lend the scene of it the light of his countenance, Caesar had stayed outside.
"Halloa! here's Uriah!" cried Ross. "Talk of the devil--just thought as much. Ever read the story of David and Uriah? Should, though. Do you good, mister. David was a great man. Aw" (with a mock imitation of Pete's Manx), "a ter'ble, wonderful, shocking great man. Uriah was his henchman. Ter'ble clavar, too, but that green for all, the ould cow might have ate him. And Uriah had a nice lil wife. The nice now, you wouldn't think. But when Uriah was away David took her, and then--and then" (dropping the Manx) "it doesn't just run on Bible lines neither, but David told Uriah that his wife was dead--ha! ha! ha!----
'Who saw her diet
I said the fly,
I saw her----'
Stop that--let go--help----You'll choke me--help! help!"
At two strides Pete had come face to face with Ross, put one of his hands at the man's throat and his leg behind him, doubled him back on his knee, and was holding him there in a grip like that of a vice.
"Help!--help!--oo--ugh!" The fellow gasped, and his face grew dark.
"You're not worth it," said Pete. "I meant to choke the life out of your dirty body for lying about the living and blackening the dead, but you're not worth hanging for. You've got the same blood in you, too, and I'm ashamed for you. There! get up."
With a gesture of indescribable loathing, Pete flung the man to the ground, and he fell over his cue and broke it.
The people of the house came thronging into the room, and met Pete going out of it. His face was hard and ugly. At first sight they mistook him for Ross, so disfigured was he by bad passions.
Caesar was tramping the pavement outside. "Will you let me do it now?" he said in a hot whisper.
"Do as you like," said Pete savagely.
"The wicked is snared in the work of his own hand. Higgaion. Selah," said Caesar, and they parted by the entrance to the Court-house.
Pete went home, muttering to himself, "The man was lying--she's dead, she's dead!"
At the gate of Elm Cottage the dog came up to him, barking with glee. Then it darted back to the house door, which stood open. "Some one has come," thought Pete. "She's dead. The man lied. She's dead," he muttered, and he stumbled down the path. _