Chapter VIII: Part SIX: The Bold Fenian Men (2)

She rose. Her hands stretched out to the Irish hills. Her voice took on the throbbing of drums:

"Oh! the Erne shall run red
With redundance of blood,
The earth shall rock beneath our tread,
And flame wrap hill and wood,
And gun-peal and slogan-cry
Make many a glen serene,
Ere you shall fade, ere you shall die,
My dark Rosaleen!
My own Rosaleen!"

"Poor Granya!" he said. He caught and kissed her hand.

She let her other fall on his shoulder for an instant.

"Good night, Shane!" she said abruptly. She moved swiftly toward the house through the yew-trees. In her pale dress against the moonlit turf, between the dark trees, she was like some old, heart-wringing ghost....

§ 10

He brought back from Tusa hErin that night a sense of dread. What in God's name had Granya done? To what committed herself? There were rumors abroad that the men of '67 were not dead yet.... In America, in the hills of Kerry, in Galway, there was plotting ... not glorious, but sinister plotting.... God! had they enmeshed her?

He had three times heard her sing the old Ulster ballad of General Munro:

Up came Munro's sister, she was well dressed in green,
And his sword by her side that was once bright and keen.
And she said to the brave men who with her did go,
"Come, we'll have revenge for my brother Munro!"

He had looked on that as only a queer romantic gesture, but with what she said last night, it occurred to him that there was a deeper motif to it all.... She was often in Dublin these days.... Did they? Had they?...

If it had been the Jacobite times, or '98 or even '48, he would not have minded. The Irish might call these Irish rebellions, but in reality they were world affairs. James and the Prince of Orange were the clash of the ideal of courtliness and tradition worn to a thin blade and of the stubborn progress of pulsing thought. And '98 was the echo of the surge for liberty--the frenzy of France and the stubborn Yankee steel.... And '48 was another breathing of the world.... Even '67 he would not have minded. Sixty-seven was a gallant romantic rally, a dream of pikes amid green banners, and men drilling by moonlit rivers....

But to-day was different.... Revenge was in the air, and revenge was no wild justice, as an old writer had said. Revenge was an evil possession.... An exhausting, sinister mood.... The men who would fight this modern battle, if battle there was to be one, were dark scowling men.... The amenities of battle, the gallantry of flags meant nothing to them. They would shoot from behind ditches in the dark.... In America was talk of dynamite--an idealist using a burglar's trick.... There was no gallantry that way....

And besides, it wasn't an Irish war. It was a matter of agriculture.... A war of peasants against careless landlords, Irish themselves in the main, who had fled to England to avoid the suicidal monotony of Irish country life, and lost their money in the pot-houses and gambling-dens of London, and turned to their tenants for more, forgetting in the glamour of London the poverty of the Irish bogs.... It was contemptible to squeeze the peasants as a money-lender squeezes his victims, but the peasants' redress, the furtive musket and horrible dynamite, that was terrible. God, what a mess!... And had Granya been caught into that evil problem, a kingfisher among cormorants?

And if she had what was he going to do about it?

What could he do? What right had he to meddle with her destiny? Friendly they had become, close sweet friends--the thought of her was like the thought of the hills purple with heather,--but friendship and destiny are a sweet curling wave and a gaunt cliff. They were two different people, independent. Shane Campbell and the Woman of Tusa hErin.

§ 11

She had been distraught all the evening. Merry, feverishly merry at times, and again silent, her eyes far off, her mouth set. She rose suddenly from the piano she was playing, and looked at him. Standing, above the light of the candles, her face and head were like some dark soft flower.

"Shane, you are a very true friend of mine, aren't you?"

"Yes, Granya."

"If I wanted a very great favor, would you consider it?"

"Not consider, but do it."

"Yes, but the risk," she faltered. "I hardly dare--"

"What risk? What are you talking about, Granya?" A thought struck him. "Is it money? Don't be silly and talk about risk! Anything I can give you is yours, and welcome!"

"It's not money, Shane. And thank you! It's--it's this--"

"Yes, Granya."

"It's this, Shane. Would you--would you bring a ship for me from St. Petersburg to Lough Foyle, very quietly?"

"What kind of a ship?"

"A ship, just a ship, a sailing-ship."

"What's in the ship?"

She paused. "Guns, Shane."

"No, Granya. I won't."

"Oh, well," she sat down, "I shouldn't have asked."

"Granya," he walked over and caught her shoulder, "don't be foolish."

"I'm not foolish, Shane. If I am, it's done now." She smiled.... The air crashed out beneath her fingers. Her voice rang:

In came the captain's daughter--the captain of the Yeos--
Saying, "Brave United Irishmen, we'll ne'er again be foes.
One thousand pounds I'll give to you, and go across the sea;
And dress myself in man's attire and fight for liberty!"

"You'll not move one foot from Tusa hErin!"

"O Shane, Tusa hErin's no longer mine, and I've got to go."

"Because the ship and the guns are mine, Shane," she smiled quietly; "my present."

With a terrific smash of the fist he broke in the top of the piano. The wires jangled in pandemonium. The candles fell to the floor.

"Hell's fire and God's damnation!" He swore at her. "You fool!"

She rose, her breasts heaving. Her eyes flashed.

"You've no right to speak to me like that, Shane Campbell."

"Oh, yes, I have. Every damned right! Do you think I'd let any woman go cruising around the North Seas, with a crew of foreigners, and a shipmaster she doesn't know.... I'll bring the bi--the boat in...."

§ 12

They left the city of strange ugly women, with great spirit in their faces, and great bearing to the body of them, and of slim cat-like men, who had great power in their eyes.... A very beautiful city of churches and hammered brass ... a place of high rarefied thinking and savage animal passion.... They left it on a July morning with the sun high.... And they sailed east, sou'east down the Gulf of Finland, until Dago Island was on their port quarter....

And they rolled down the Baltic Sea, sailing sou'-sou'west, until they passed Gotland, and they edged west again, leaving Bornholm to port.... And they sailed past Malmö into the Sound, heading north for the Cattegat.... They turned the Skaw and swung her into the Skage-Rack.... And the wind held....

And once out of there, they pointed her nose nor'west by nor' as though Iceland were only a buoy in a yacht-race.... And the wind held.... The summer nights of the North were on them, the unearthly beauty of the light.... There was no world.... They were sailing on the Milky Way.... Only the gurgle of the water at the bows, the _whush_ of the wake beneath the counter, held them as by a thin umbilical cord to the world of men.... The _whap-whap-whap_ of the cordage.... The _ting-ting-ting_ of the helmsman's bell.... The cry for'a'd: "The lights are burning bright, sir!" ...

§ 13

The gaunt Shetlands were on their starboard beam now, the dun Orkneys off the port bow. Sumburgh Head dropped away, and they headed due west.... The waves were laughing, the sun rose in a great explosion abaft of them.... The world was a very small place.... The universe so large.... At dawn the gulls chattered and whined, and screamed until they felt immense loneliness.... One seemed to be intruding in a world of white feathers and cold inimical eyes, and complaints in a language one could not understand.... So lonely ... so undefiled ... the home of the great whale.... Here was the world as God first made it ... clean and beautiful and absolute.... Up here steam engines seemed ridiculous toys.... In winter the sleek seal and the great white bear.... And the great crying of the gulls.... One thought of Adelina Patti's great singing and wondered did it matter a lot.

And they swung sou'west by sou' to leave the Hebrides to port. They were on the last leg of the voyage, and the wind still held....

"O Shane, it's wonderful...." She had come on deck in her man's clothing.... She was so tall, so slim, her legs so long, it seemed some pleasant feminine fancy of hers, not a material adaptation of the life on board ship. "The wind will hold until we get there."

"I don't like it," Shane grumbled.

"Why, Shane? Why don't you like it?"

"We're too lucky."

"It isn't luck, Shane. It's the will of God."

"Hmm!"

"Granya!"

"Yes, Shane."

"I've just been thinking. Why couldn't you conspirators have chosen a better time of the year than August for landing your arms? There's only about two hours of night."

"Because, Shane, the arms must be ready for autumn, when the harvest is in. That's the best time for a revolution. And the arms must be distributed. And the men must drill a little. Now is our only time."

"Hmm."

"O Shane, I wish you would be a little enthusiastic."

"Enthusiastic? At forty-nine!"

"Are you forty-nine, Shane? You don't seem thirty-nine. None could tell but for the little gray in your hair.... And Shane...."

"Yes!"

"I like your hair rumpled a little with the sea-air ... much better than when it is sleek in Antrim.... Shane, you don't know how well you look on board ship."

"Ooh, be damned to that.... Mr. Janseen, get them to lay aft, and see if you can't get a little more out of that mizzen.... A little more pocket in the luff." ...

§ 14

They passed the Butt of Lewis, sailing due sou'west.... To port they left the Seven Hunters, changing the course to sou'west by sou'.... The Hebrides passed them like islands in a dream, purple, gleaming strangely in the sunlight, now a black shower whipping over them, now sunshine pouring in great floods.... Lewis went by, and then Harris.... North Uist where the winds blow so hard they have an old word: _Is traugh fear na droiche air mhachair Uistibh_: 'Tis a pity of the slut's husband on the plains of Uist.... You'll be needing buttons on your coat there.... They passed Rona of the Seals, and Benbecula.... They passed South Uist and Eriskay.... They passed the Ponboy Isles.... The islands of the Cat they called them in Gaelic.... Faintly they saw the mists of Hecla ... heard the curlews.... They saw fishing-boats with great brown sails....

Honk-honk of wild ganders in the distance, and occasionally the _chugh_ of a diving bird.... The wind blew from the nor'west.... The foam snarled beneath the bows....

"I don't like it.... I don't like it...."

"Shane, it is wonderful.... God is with us."

"Hunh...." He saw the weather leaches flick.... "Don't let her come up," he roared at the helmsman. "Steer her, you Swede bastard.... Where the hell did you ever steer before? On a canal?"

"Shane!"

"What is it, Granya?"

"Your language, Shane!"

"Listen, Granya.... I'm not playing a comedy.... I'm sailing a ship ... that's on an errand I don't like.... If you don't like my language, get below...."

"Sorry, Shane!" She said with a meek courtesy. She stayed....

They passed Skerryvore.... They passed Dhu Heartach, Colonsay, Islay of McCrimmin.... Iristrahull was on the weather beam.... They swung eastward.... Irishowen Head showed off the port bow.... On an August afternoon, they slipped into Lough Foyle....

§ 15

The soft luminosity of a summer night was in it ... and a little moon, which Shane damned.... Before them rose the outline of Donegal.... On each beam they could see faintly the outlines of the bay's arms.... The schooner moved under jibs and mizzen.... From the bow was the splash of the lead....

"By the mark, fine!"

"Luff her a little, a little more ... steady!"

"Four fathoms, no bottom!"

"Keep her off a point!"

"By the deep, four!"

"How's the bottom?"

"Clean and sandy, sir!"

"No bottom at three!"

"Ready for'a'd to let go?"

"All ready, sir!"

"The mark three, no bottom!"

"Lee--o!... Hold her!"

The long swish of oars, the rattle of oar-locks.... A voice rapping out:

"Rest on the oars!" And then: "Schooner ahoy!"

Shane's heart sank. He gave no answer.

"What ship is that?" The voice rang over the little bay ... found a grotesque echo in some cliff....

"Who are you?"

"His Majesty's coast-guards. Stand by. Coming aboard. Lay on your oars, men!"

And then ... a long instant.... "Toss oars!"

"Bring her into the wind!" Shane ordered....

A scramble alongside, and some one was coming over the waist rail.... A firm step on deck.... Some one was smiling....

"My name's Flannagan, Lieutenant Flannagan.... Sorry, Mr. Campbell, we can't let you land ... your cargo or your passenger...."

"I don't understand."

"Well, sir, we know what your cargo is, and my orders are not to let you land. And I was to tell you, sir, that you couldn't land anywhere."

"By God! I knew it would end like this.... Are we under arrest?"

"No, sir.... You are just not to land. I'm sorry, sir, but.... Orders!"

"Then what the blazes am I going to do?"

"Jove, I don't know. Can't you bring the cargo back where you got it?"

"I suppose I'll have to do that. But my passenger.... I can put her ashore."

"I'm sorry, sir. But your passenger can't go ashore, anywhere, any time, in her Majesty's dominions."

"Hmm!"

He heard her quick step on the companionway.

"Shane."

"Shane, are you there?"

"Shane, Shane, what's wrong?" She came into the shrouded light of the binnacle. "Shane, who--who is this?"

"My name's Flannagan, Miss O'Malley--royal navy--I'm sorry; you can't land."

"What does it mean, Shane?"

"You're beaten, Granya."

"Are we prisoners?"

"No, Miss O'Malley, just you can't land. And I'm very distressed to tell you.... You may not land anywhere, any time, in her Majesty's dominions."

"That doesn't shut out Mr. Campbell, does it?"

"I've no orders against him, Miss O'Malley, barring his landing his cargo or you...."

She laid her hand on Shane's arm....

"I'm sorry, Shane.... I'm very sorry, my dear--dear friend.... You were so good.... There are few--would have sacrificed their time and profession, and everything--to help a woman on a wild-goose ideal!--like mine was.... So please forgive me!"

"There's nothing to forgive, Granya...."

"I want to do this ..." she leaned forward and kissed him.... The lieutenant turned away. "And now good-by."

"Why good-by? I'm not going ashore. I'll stick."

"Dear Shane, you would." She caught his hand, pressed, dropped it. Her voice rang out: "But I'm going ashore...." She had swung over the taffrail and dropped into the water with the soft splash of a fish....

"My God ...!" Shane swore with rage. "Wait. I'll get her. Will you stand by with your boat?"

"Right-o!" Flannagan answered cheerily.

Shane kicked off his shoes, slipped out of his coat.... "This damned woman!" he thought as he dropped astern, came out, began to cast for direction like an otter-hound.... He heard her soft rhythmical strokes ahead.... He tore after her ... caught up ... reached her shoulder....

"Come back, Granya!"

"No, Shane."

He had decided, once he reached her, to turn her back by force, but the strange gentle voice restrained him. All this matter of Ireland, all this expedition of opera bouffe, took on again a strange dimension when she spoke.... All the time he had been foolish, he knew, and, worse, looked like a fool, but some strange magic of her voice made it seem natural ... the naïve brave gestures.... One levitated above common ground.... Even this moon-madness did not seem trivial and a thing for laughter.... A dignity of ancient stories was on it.... The blue Irish hills, soft as down, the little moon, and the tide hurrying out of the lough to the great Atlantic.... A wrench of the will and he gripped her shoulder:

"Shane, please don't!"

"You're coming back, Granya."

"I'm not, Shane, and please don't hold me. I'm getting weak."

"You'll never make it, Granya. And if you did, where would you go on the Donegal hills?"

"I don't know, Shane. But please let me go, I implore you.... Even if I do go down.... Don't you see? There is nothing for me but this, or death.... My life.... O Shane, let me go!"

"Quiet, Granya!" He caught her wrist.

"Please, Shane. Please. I pray of you...." She began to twist.... "O Shane, you hurt."

"Quiet, Granya. Boat--o!"

The lantern of the coast-guards' cutter came nearer.... The measured swish of the oars ... the creak.... She began to struggle fiercely....

"Granya, if you don't keep quiet, I'll have to hit you...."

"O Shane!" she whimpered....

"All right Get her on board. Steady, there. Trim a little. Good!" Flannagan and a great bearded coast-guard had her.... The silence was broken with her little sobs.... He helped her over the waist of the schooner....

"Go below, Granya, and get into some dry clothes.... Mr. Flannagan, I'll take the boat back to St. Petersburg.... If Miss O'Malley doesn't land neither do I. May I send a letter ashore? It's only about business, and the place in the glens...."

"I'll take it and have it sent."

"Another thing; we want to get some provisions and water."

"Of course, sir.... That's all right."

"Do you think one of the country girls could be persuaded to come on board as Miss O'Malley's maid?"

"I think so. We'll ask the local priest."

"Oh, yes, the priest.... Another thing: do you think you could dig out a parson around here somewhere and bring him on board?"

"O Shane, what do you want that for?" She hadn't gone below, but waited in the companionway.

"You don't think you're going wandering around with me, casually, like this?"

"But it's only to St. Petersburg, Shane!"

"And then where do you go? What do you do?"

"I--I--I don't know."

"Better get the parson, Mr. Flannagan."

"Oh, but Shane--" she protested.

"Go below, Granya, and get those wet things off.... And get into women's clothes.... Granya!"

"Yes, Shane.... Very well, Shane...."