The Manxman

"I never had n.o.body there belonging to me," began Grannie.

"No, then, n.o.body?" said Caesar.

"One that was going to be, maybe, if he'd lived, poor boy----"

"Grannie!" shouted Pete, and he burst into the bar-room.

"Goodness me!" cried Grannie; "it's his own voice anyway."

"It's himself," shouted Pete, and the old soul was in his arms in an instant.

"Aw dear! Aw dear!" she panted. "Pete it is for sure. Let me sit down, though."

"Did you think it was his ghost, then, mother!" said Caesar with an indulgent air.

"'Deed no," said Grannie. "The lad wouldn't come back to plague n.o.body, thinks I."

"Still, and for all the upris.e.m.e.nt of Peter, it bates everything," said Caesar. "It's a sort of a resurrection. I thought I'd have a sight up to the packet for his chiss, poor fellow, and, behould ye, who should I meet in the two eyes but the man himself!"

"Aw, dear! It's wonderful I it's terrible! I'm silly with the joy," said Grannie.

"It was lies in the letter the Manx ones were writing," said Caesar.

"Letters and writings are all lies," said Grannie. "As long as I live I'll take no more of them, and if that Kelly, the postman, comes here again, I'll take the bellows to him."

"So you thought I was gone for good, Grannie?" said Pete. "Well, I thought so too. 'Will I die?' I says to myself times and times; but I bethought me at last there wasn't no sense in a good man like me laving his bones out on the bare Veldt yonder; so, you see, I spread my wings and came home again."

"It's the Lord's doings--it's marvellous in our eyes," said Caesar; and Grannie, who had recovered herself and was bustling about, cried--

"Let me have a right look at him, then. Goodness me, the whisker! And as soft as Manx carding from the mill, too. I like him best when he takes off his hat. Well, I'm proud to see you, boy. 'Deed, but I wouldn't have known you, though. 'Who's the gentleman in the gig with father?' thinks I. And I'd have said it was the Dempster himself, if he hadn't been dead and in his coffin."

"That'll do, that'll do," roared Pete. "That's Grannie putting the fun on me."

"It's no use talking, but I can't keep quiet; no

"But where's Kate?" said Pete.

"Aw, yes, where is she? Kate! Kate!" called Grannie, leaning her head toward the stairs, and Nancy Joe, who had been standing silent until now, said----

"Didn't she go to Ramsey with the gig, woman?"

"Aw, the foolish I am! Of course she did," said Grannie; "but why hasn't she come back with father?"

"She left word at Crellin's not to wait," said Caesar.

"She'll be gone to Miss Clucas's to try on," said Nancy.

"Wouldn't trust now," said Grannie. "She's having two new dresses done, Pete. Aw, girls are ter'ble. Well, can you blame them either?"

"She shall have two-and-twenty if she likes, G.o.d bless her," said Pete.

"Goodness me!" said Nancy, "is the man for buying frocks for a Mormon?"

"But you'll be empty, boy. Put the crow down and the griddle on, Nancy,"

said Grannie. "We'll have cakes. Cakes? Coorse I said cakes. Get me the cloth and I'll lay it myself. The cloth, I'm saying, woman. Did you never hear of a tablecloth? Where is it? Aw, dear knows where it is now! It's in the parlour; no, it's in the chest on the landing; no, it's under the sheets of my own bed. Fetch it, bogh."

"Will I bring you a handful of gorse, mother?" said Caesar.

"Coorse you will, and not stand chattering there. But I'm laving you dry, Pete. Is it ale you'll have, or a drop of hard stuff? You'll wait for Kate? Now I like that. There's some life at these totallers. 'Steady abroad?' How dare you, Nancy Joe? You're a deal too clever. Of course he's been steady abroad--steady as a gun."

"But Kate," said Pete, tramping the sanded floor, "is she changed at all?"

"Aw, she's a woman now, boy," said Grannie.

"Bless my soul!" said Pete.

"She was looking a bit white and narvous one while there, but she's sprung out of it fresh and bright, same as the ling on the mountains.

Well, that's the way with young women."

"I know," said Pete. "Just the break of the morning with the darlings."

"But she's the best-looking girl on the island now, Pete," said Nancy Joe.

"I'll go bail on it," cried Pete.

"Big and fine and rosy, and fit for anything."

"Bless my heart!"

"You should have seen her at the Melliah; it was a trate."

"G.o.d bless me!"

"Sun-bonnet and pink frock and tight red stockings, and straight as a standard rase."

"Hould your tongue, woman," shouted Pete. "I'll see herself first, and I'm dying to do it."

Caesar came back with the gorse; Nancy fed the fire and Grannie stirred the oatmeal and water. And while the cakes were baking, Pete tramped the kitchen and examined everything and recognised old friends with a roar.

"Bless me! the same place still. There's the clock on the shelf, with the scratch on its face and the big finger broke at the joint, and the lath--and the peck--and the whip--you've had it new corded, though----"

"'Sakes, how the boy remembers!" cried Grannie.

"And the white rumpy" (the cat had leapt on to the dresser out of the reach of Pete's dog, and from that elevation was eyeing him steadfastly), "and the slowrie--and the kettle--and the poker--my gracious, the very poker----"

"Now, did you ever!" cried Grannie with amazement.

"And--yes--no--it is, though--I'll swear it before the Dempster--that's," said Pete, picking up a three-legged stool, "that's the very stool she was sitting on herself in the fire-seat in front of the turf closet. Let me sit there now for the sake of ould times gone by."