_ PART IV. MAN AND WIFE
CHAPTER XVII
The bar-room of "The Manx Fairy" was full of gossips 'that night, and the puffing of many pipes was suspended at a story that Mr. Jelly was telling.
"Strange enough, I'm thinking. 'Deed, but it's mortal strange. Talk about tale-books--there's nothing in the 'Pilgrim's Progress' itself to equal it. The son of one son coming home Dempster, with processions and bands of music, at the very minute the son of the other son is getting kicked out of the house same as a dog."
"Strange uncommon," said John the Widow, and other voices echoed him.
Jonaique looked round the room, expecting some one to question him. As nobody did so, except with looks of inquiry, he said, "My ould man heard it all. He's been tailor at the big house since the time of Iron Christian himself."
"Truth enough," said Caesar.
"And he was sewing a suit for the big man in the kitchen when the bad work was going doing upstairs."
"You don't say!"
"'You've robbed me!' says the Ballawhaine."
"Dear heart alive!" cried Grannie. "To his own son, was it?"
"'You've cheated me!' says he, 'you deceaved me, you've embezzled my money and broke my heart!' says he. 'I've spent a fortune on you, and what have you brought me back?' says he. 'This,' says he, 'and this--and this--barefaced forgeries, all of them!' says he."
"The Lord help us!" muttered Caesar.
"'They're calling me a miser, aren't they?' says he. 'I grind my people to the dust, do I? What for, then? _Whom_ for? I've been a good father to you, anyway, and a fool, too, if nobody knows it!' says he."
"Nobody! Did he say nobody, Mr. Jelly?" said Caesar, screwing up his mouth.
"'If you'd had _my_ father to deal with,' says he, 'he'd have turned you out long ago for a liar and a thief.' 'My God, father,' says Ross, struck silly for the minute. 'A thief, d'ye hear me?' says the Ballawhaine; 'a thief that's taken every penny I have in the world, and left me a ruined man.'"
"Did he say that?" said Caesar.
"He did, though," said Jonaique. "The ould man was listening from the kitchen-stairs, and young Ross snaked out of the house same as a cur."
"And where's he gone to?" said Caesar.
"Gone to the devil, I'm thinking," said Jonaique.
"Well, he'd be good enough for him with a broken back--pity the ould man didn't break it," said Caesar. "But where is the wastrel now?"
"Gone to England over with to-night's packet, they're saying."
"Praise God, from whom all blessings flow," said Caesar.
A grunt came out of the corner from behind a cloud of smoke. "You've your own rasons for saying so, Caesar," said the husky voice of Black Tom. "People were talking and talking one while there that he'd be 'bezzling somebody's daughter, as well as the ould miser's money."
"Answer a fool according to his folly," muttered Caesar; and then the door jerked open, and Pete came staggering into the room. Every pipe shank was lowered in an instant, and Grannie's needles ceased to click.
Pete was still bareheaded, his face was ghastly white, and his eyes wandered, but he tried to bear himself as if nothing had happened. Smiling horribly, and nodding all round, as a man does sometimes in battle the moment the bullet strikes him, he turned to Grannie and moved his lips a little as if he thought he was saying something, though he uttered no sound. After that he took out his pipe, and rammed it with his forefinger, then picked a spill from the table, and stooped to the fire for a light.
"Anybody--belonging--me--here?" he said, in a voice like a crow's, coughing as he spoke, the flame dancing over the pipe mouth.
"No, Pete, no," said Grannie. "Who were you looking for, at all?"
"Nobody," he answered. "Nobody partic'lar. Aw, no," he said, and he puffed until his lips quacked, though the pipe gave out no smoke. "Just come in to get fire to my pipe. Must be going now. So long, boys! S'long! Bye-bye, Grannie!"
No one answered him. He nodded round the room again and smiled fearfully, crossed to the door with a jaunty roll, and thus launched out of the house with a pretence of unconcern, the dead pipe hanging upside down in his mouth, and his head aside, as if his hat had been tilted rakishly on his uncovered hair.
When he had gone the company looked into each other's faces in surprise and fear, as if a ghost in broad daylight had passed among them. Then Black Tom broke the silence.
"Men," said he, "that was a d------ lie."
"Si------" began Caesar, but the protest foundered in his dry throat.
"Something going doing in Ramsey," Black Tom continued. "I believe in my heart I'll follow him."
"I'll be going along with you, Mr. Quilliam," said Jonaique.
"And I," said John the Clerk.
"And I"--"And I," said the others, and in half a minute the room was empty.
"Father," whimpered Grannie, through the glass partition, "hadn't you better saddle the mare and see if any thing's going wrong with Kirry?"
"I was thinking the same myself, mother."
"Come, then, away with you. The Lord have mercy on all of us!" _