_ CHAPTER XIV
Thomas Antony Kinsella sat with his legs dangling over the edge of the quay. Beneath him lay his boat. The tide was flowing, but it had not yet floated her. She was supported on an even keel by the mooring ropes made fast from her bow and stern to bollards on the quay. Her sails and gear lay in confusion on her thwarts. She was still half full of gravel although some of her cargo had been shovelled out and lay in a heap behind Kinsella. He was apparently disinclined to shovel out the rest, an excusable laziness, for the day was very hot.
With the point of a knife Kinsella scraped the charred ash from the bowl of his pipe. Then he cut several thin slices from a plug of black twist tobacco, rolled them slowly between the palm of one hand and the thumb of the other; spat thoughtfully over the side of the quay into his boat, charged his pipe and put it into his mouth. There he held it for some minutes while he stared glassily at the top of his boat's mast. He spat again and then drew a match from his waistcoat pocket.
Sergeant Rafferty of the Royal Irish Constabulary strolled quietly along the quay. It was his duty to stroll somewhere every day in order to intimidate malefactors. He found the quay on the whole a more interesting place than any of the country roads round the town, so he often chose it for the scene of what his official regulations described as a "patrol." When he reached Kinsella he stopped.
"Good day to you," he said.
Kinsella, without looking round, struck his match on a stone beside him and lit his pipe. He sucked in three draughts of smoke, spat again and then acknowledged the sergeant's greeting.
"It's a fine day," said the sergeant
"It is," said Kinsella, "thanks be to God."
The sergeant stirred the pile of gravel on the quay thoughtfully with his foot Then, peering over Kinsella's shoulder, he took a look at the gravel which still remained in the boat.
"Tell me this, now, Joseph Antony," he said. "Who might that gravel be for? It's the third day you're after bringing in a load and there's ne'er a cart's been down for it yet?"
"I couldn't say who it might be for."
"Do you tell me that now? And who's to pay you for it?"
"Sweeny 'll pay for it," said Kinsella. "It was him ordered it."
The sergeant stirred the gravel again with his foot Timothy Sweeny was a publican who kept a small shop in one of the back streets of Rosnacree. He was known to the sergeant, but was not regarded with favour. There is a way into Sweeny's house through a back-yard which is reached by climbing a wall. Sweeny's front door was always shut on Sundays and his shutters were put up during those hours when the law regards the consumption of alcohol as undesirable. But the sergeant had good reason to suppose that many thirsty people found their way to the refreshment they craved through the back-yard. Sweeny was an object of suspicion and dislike to the sergeant. Therefore he stirred the gravel on the quay again and again looked at the gravel in the boat. There is no law against buying gravel; but it seemed to the sergeant very difficult to believe that Sweeny had bought four boatloads of it. Joseph Antony Kinsella felt that some explanation was due to the sergeant.
"It's a gentleman up the country," he said, "that Sweeny's buying the gravel for. I did hear that he's to send it by rail when I have the whole of it landed."
He watched the sergeant out of the corners of his eyes to see how he would receive this statement. The sergeant did not seem to be altogether satisfied.
"What are you getting for it?" he asked.
"Five shillings a load."
"You're doing well," said the sergeant.
"It's good gravel, so it is, the best."
"It may be good gravel," said the sergeant, "but the gentleman that's buying it will buy it dear if you take the half of every load you bring in home in the evening and fetch it here again the next morning along with a little more."
The sergeant stared at the gravel in the boat as he spoke. His face had cleared, and the look of suspicion had left his eyes. Sweeny, so his instinct told him, must be engaged in some kind of wrongdoing.
Now he understood what it was. The gentleman up the country was to be defrauded of half the gravel he paid for. Curiously enough, considering that his wrongdoing had been detected, the look of anxiety left Kinsella's face. He sucked at his pipe, found that it had gone out, and slipped it into his waistcoat pocket.
"If neither Sweeny nor the gentleman is making any complaint," he said, "it would suit you to keep your mouth shut."
"I'm not blaming you," said the sergeant "Sure, anybody'd do the same if they got the chance."
"If there's people in the world," said Kinsella, "that hasn't sense enough to see that they get what they pay for, oughtn't we to be thankful for it?"
"You're right there," said the sergeant
Kinsella took out his pipe and lit it again. Sergeant Rafferty after examining the sea with attentive scrutiny for some minutes, strolled back towards his barracks.
Peter Walsh slid off the window sill of Brannigan's shop and took a long look at the sky. Having satisfied himself that its appearance was very much what he expected he walked down the quay to the place where Kinsella was sitting.
"It's a fine evening," he said.
"It is," said Kinsella, "as fine an evening as you'd see, thanks be to God."
Peter Walsh sat down beside his friend and spat into the boat beneath him.
"I seen the sergeant talking to you," he said.
"That same sergeant has mighty little to do," said Kinsella.
"It'll be as well for us if he hasn't more one of these days."
"What do you mean by that, Peter Walsh?"
"What might he have been talking to you about?"
"Gravel, no less."
"Asking who it might be for or the like? Would you say, now, Joseph Antony, that he was anyways uneasy in his mind?"
"He was uneasy," said Kinsella, "but he's easy now."
"Did you tell him who the gravel was for?"
"Is it likely I'd tell him when I didn't know myself? What I told him was that Timothy Sweeny had the gravel bought off me at five shillings a load and that it was likely he'd be sending it by rail to some gentleman up the country that would have it ordered from him."
"And what did he say to that?"
"What he as good as said was that Timothy Sweeny and myself would have the gentleman cheated out of half the gravel he'd paid for by the time he'd got the other half. There was a smile on his face like there might be on a man, and him after a long drink, when he found out the way we were getting the better of the gentleman up the country. Believe you me, Peter Walsh, he wouldn't have rested easy in his bed until he did find out, either that or some other thing."
"That sergeant is as cute as a pet fox," said Peter Walsh. "You'd be hard set to keep anything from him that he wanted to know."
Kinsella sat for some minutes without speaking. Then he took a match from his pocket and lit his pipe for the third time.
"I'd be glad," he said, "if you'd tell me what it was you had in your mind when you said a minute ago that the sergeant might maybe have more to do than he'd care for one of these days."
Peter Walsh looked carefully round him in every direction and satisfied himself that there was no one within earshot.
"Was I telling you," he said, "about the gentleman, and the lady along with him that came in on the train today?"
"You were not."
"Well, he came, and I'm thinking that he's a high-up man."
"What about him?"
"The sergeant was sent for up to the big house," said Peter Walsh, "soon after the strange gentleman came. I don't know rightly what they wanted with him. Sweeny was asking Constable Maloney after; but sure the boy knew no more than I did myself."
"It's a curious thing," said Kinsella, "so it is, damned curious."
"Damned," said Peter Walsh.
"I wouldn't be sorry if the whole lot of them was drownded one of these days."
"I wouldn't like anything would happen to the young lady."
"Is it Priscilla? I wasn't meaning her. But any way, Peter Walsh, you know well the sea wouldn't drown that one."
"It would not, surely. Why would it?"
"What I had in my mind," said Kinsella, "was the rest of them."
He looked sadly at the sky and then out across the sea, which was perfectly calm.
"But there'll be no drowning," he added with a sigh, "while the weather holds the way it is."
"There's a feel in the air," said Peter Walsh hopefully, "like as if there might be thunder."
A small boat, rowed by a boy, stole past them up the harbour. Neither of the two men spoke until she reached the slip at the end of the quay.
"I'd be sorry," said Kinsella, "if anything would happen to them two that does be going about in Flanagan's old boat. There's no harm in them barring the want of sense."
"It would be as well for them to be kept off Inishbawn for all that."
"They never offered to set foot on the island," said Kinsella, "since the day I told them that herself and the childer had the fever. The way it is with them, they wouldn't care where they'd be, one place being the same to them as another, if they'd be let alone."
"That's what they will not be, then."
"On account of Priscilla?"
"Her and the young fellow she has with her. They're out hunting them two that has Flanagan's old boat the same as it might be some of the boys at a coursing match and the hare in front of them. Such chasing you never seen! It was up out of their beds they were this morning at six o'clock, when you'd think the likes of them would be asleep."
"I seen them," said Kinsella.
"And the one of them is as bad as the other. You'd be hard put to it to say whether it was Priscilla has put the comether on the young fellow or him that had her druv' on to be doing what it would be better for her to leave alone."
"Tell me this now, Peter Walsh, that young fellow is by the way of having a sore leg on him, so they tell me. Would you say now but that might be a trick the way it would put us off from suspecting any mischief he might be up to?"
"I was thinking myself," said Peter, "that he might be imposing on us; but it's my opinion now that the leg's genuine. I followed them up last night, unbeknown to them, to see would he get out of the perambulator when he was clear of the town and nobody to notice him. But he kept in it and she wheeled him up to the big house every step of the way."
The evidence was conclusive and carried complete conviction to Kinsella's mind.
"What would be your own opinion," said Peter Walsh, "about that one that does be going about the bay in your own boat along with Jimmy?"
"I wouldn't say there'd be much harm in her. Jimmy says it's hard to tell what she'd be after. He did think at the first go off that it might be cockles; but it's not, for he took her to Carribee strand, where there's plenty of them, and the devil a one she'd pick up. Nor it's not periwinkles. Nor dilishk, though they do say that the dilishk is reckoned to be a cure for consumption, and you'd think it might be that. But Jimmy says it's not, for he offered her a bit yesterday and she wouldn't look at it."
"I don't know what else it could be," said Peter Walsh.
"Nor I don't know. But Jimmy says she doesn't speak like one that would be any ways in with the police."
"She was in Brannigan's last night, buying peppermint drops and every kind of foolishness, the same as she might be a little girleen that was given a penny and her just out of school."
"If she hasn't more sense at her time of life," said Kinsella, "she never will."
"Seeing it's that sort she is, I wouldn't say we'd any need to be caring where she goes so long as it isn't to Inishbawn."
"She'll not go there," said Kinsella, "for if she does I'll flay the skin of Jimmy's back with the handle of a hay-rake, and well he knows it."
"If I was easy in my mind about the strange gentleman that's up at the big house----"
"It's a curious thing, so it is, him sending for the sergeant the minute he came."
"Bedamn," said Peter Walsh, "but it is."
The extreme oddness of the strange gentleman's conduct affected both men profoundly. For fully five minutes they sat staring at the sea, motionless, save when one or the other of them thrust his head forward a little in order to spit. Kinsella at last got out his pipe, probed the tobacco a little with the point of his knife so as to loosen it, pressed it together again with his thumb, and then lit it.
"I wouldn't mind the sergeant," he said, "cute and all as he thinks himself, I wouldn't mind him. It's the strange gentleman I'm thinking of."
The
Tortoise stole round the end of the quay while he spoke. Kinsella eyed her. He noticed at once that Priscilla was steering with an oar. In his acutely suspicious mood every trifle was a matter for investigation.
"What's wrong with her," he said, "that she wouldn't steer with the rudder when she has one?"
"It might be," said Peter Walsh, "that she's lost it. You couldn't tell what the likes of her would do."
"She was in trouble this morning when I seen her," said Kinsella, "but she had the rudder then."
Priscilla hailed them from the boat
"Hullo, Peter!" she shouted. "Go down to the slip and be ready to take the boat. Have you the bath chair ready?"
"I have, Miss. It's there standing beside the slip where you left it this morning. Who'd touch the like? What's happened the rudder?"
"Iron's broken," said Priscilla, "and it must be mended tonight. I say, Kinsella, Jimmy's leg isn't near as bad as you'd think it would be, after having the horn of a wild bull run through it."
"It wasn't a bull at all, Miss, but a heifer."
"I don't see that it makes much difference which it was," said Priscilla.
"Do you hear that now?" said Kinsella to his friend in a whisper. "Believe you me, Peter Walsh, it's as good for the whole of us that she's not in the police."
"What's that you're saying?" said Priscilla.
The boat, though the wind had almost left her sails, drifted up on the rising tide and was already past the spot where the two men were sitting. Peter Walsh got up and shouted his answer after her.
"Joseph Antony Kinsella," he said, "is just after telling me that it's his belief that you'd make a grand sergeant of police."
"It's a good job for him that I'm not," said Priscilla. "For the first thing I'd do if I was would be to go out and see what it is he has going on on Inishbawn."
Peter Walsh, without unduly hurrying himself, arrived at the slip before the
Tortoise. Priscilla stepped ashore and handed him the rudder.
"Take that to the smith," she said, "and tell him to put a new iron on it this evening. We'll want it again tomorrow morning."
"I'll tell him, Miss; but I wouldn't say he'd do it for you."
"He'd jolly well better," said Priscilla.
"That same Patsy the smith," said Peter Walsh, "has a terrible strong hate in him for doing anything in a hurry whether it's little or big."
"Just you tell him from me," said Priscilla, "that if I don't get that rudder properly settled when I want it tomorrow morning, I'll go out to Inishbawn, in spite of your rats and your heifers."
Peter Walsh's face remained perfectly impassive. Not even in his eyes was there the smallest expression of surprise or uneasiness.
"What would be the good of saying the like of that to him?" he said. "It's laughing at me he'd be, for he wouldn't understand what I'd mean."
"Don't tell me," said Priscilla. "Whatever villainy there is going on between you and Joseph Antony Kinsella, Patsy the smith will be in it along with you."
Peter Walsh helped Frank into the bath-chair. Priscilla, her face wearing a most determined expression, wheeled him away.
"That rudder will be ready all right," she said.
"But what do you think is going on on the island?" asked Frank.
"I don't know."
"Could they be smuggling?"
"They might be smuggling, only I don't see where they'd get anything to smuggle. Anyway, it's no business of ours so long as we get the rudder. I don't think it's at all a good plan, Cousin Frank, to be always poking our noses into other people's secrets, when we don't absolutely have to."
It occurred to Frank that Priscilla had shown some eagerness in probing the private affairs of the young couple who had hired Flanagan's boat. He did not, however, feel it necessary to make this obvious retort.
Peter Walsh, the rudder under his arm, went back to Joseph Antony Kinsella, who was still sitting on the edge of the quay.
"She says," he said, "that without there's a new iron on that rudder tomorrow morning, she'll go out to Inishbawn and the young fellow along with her."
"Let Patsy the smith put it on for her, then."
"Sure he can't."
"And what's to hinder him?"
"He was drunk an hour ago," said Peter Walsh, "and he'll be drunker now."
"Bedamn then, but you'd better take him down and dip him in the tide, for I'll not have that young fellow with the sore leg on Inishbawn. If it was only herself I wouldn't care."
"I'd be afeard to do it," said Peter Walsh.
"Afeard of what?"
"Afeard of Patsy the smith. Sure it's a madman he is when his temper's riz."
"Let you come along with me," said Kinsella, "and I'll wake him up if it takes the brand of a hot iron to do it. He can be as mad as he likes after, but he'll put an iron on that rudder before ever he gets leave to kill you or any other man." _