Samuel
Margaret Henan would have been a striking figure under anycircumstances, but never more so than when I first chanced uponher, a sack of grain of fully a hundredweight on her shoulder, asshe walked with sure though tottering stride from the cart-tail tothe stable, pausing for an instant to gather strength at the footof the steep steps that led to the grain-bin. There were four ofthese steps, and she went up them, a step at a time, slowly,unwaveringly, and with so dogged certitude that it never entered mymind that her strength could fail her and let that hundred-weightsack fall from the lean and withered frame that wellnigh doubledunder it. For she was patently an old woman, and it was her agethat made me linger by the cart and watch.Six times she went between the cart and the stable, each time witha full sack on her back, and beyond passing the time of day with meshe took no notice of my presence. Then, the cart empty, shefumbled for matches and lighted a short clay pipe, pressing downthe burning surface of the tobacco with a calloused and apparentlynerveless thumb. The hands were noteworthy. They were large-knuckled, sinewy and malformed by labour, rimed with callouses, thenails blunt and broken, and with here and there cuts and bruises,healed and healing, such as are common to the hands of hard-workingmen. On the back were huge, upstanding veins, eloquent of age andtoil. Looking at them, it was hard to believe that they were thehands of the woman who had once been the belle of Island McGill.This last, of course, I learned later. At the time I knew neitherher history nor her identity.She wore heavy man's brogans. Her legs were stockingless, and Ihad noticed when she walked that her bare feet were thrust into thecrinkly, iron-like shoes that sloshed about her lean ankles atevery step. Her figure, shapeless and waistless, was garbed in arough man's shirt and in a ragged flannel petticoat that had oncebeen red. But it was her face, wrinkled, withered and weather-beaten, surrounded by an aureole of unkempt and straggling wisps ofgreyish hair, that caught and held me. Neither drifted hair norserried wrinkles could hide the splendid dome of a forehead, highand broad without verging in the slightest on the abnormal.The sunken cheeks and pinched nose told little of the quality ofthe life that flickered behind those clear blue eyes of hers.Despite the minutiae of wrinkle-work that somehow failed to weazenthem, her eyes were clear as a girl's - clear, out-looking, andfar-seeing, and with an open and unblinking steadfastness of gazethat was disconcerting. The remarkable thing was the distancebetween them. It is a lucky man or woman who has the width of aneye between, but with Margaret Henan the width between her eyes wasfully that of an eye and a half. Yet so symmetrically moulded washer face that this remarkable feature produced no uncanny effect,and, for that matter, would have escaped the casual observer'snotice. The mouth, shapeless and toothless, with down-turnedcorners and lips dry and parchment-like, nevertheless lacked themuscular slackness so usual with age. The lips might have beenthose of a mummy, save for that impression of rigid firmness theygave. Not that they were atrophied. On the contrary, they seemedtense and set with a muscular and spiritual determination. There,and in the eyes, was the secret of the certitude with which shecarried the heavy sacks up the steep steps, with never a false stepor overbalance, and emptied them in the grain-bin."You are an old woman to be working like this," I ventured.She looked at me with that strange, unblinking gaze, and shethought and spoke with the slow deliberateness that characterizedeverything about her, as if well aware of an eternity that was hersand in which there was no need for haste. Again I was impressed bythe enormous certitude of her. In this eternity that seemed soindubitably hers, there was time and to spare for safe-footing andstable equilibrium - for certitude, in short. No more in herspiritual life than in carrying the hundredweights of grain wasthere a possibility of a misstep or an overbalancing. The feelingproduced in me was uncanny. Here was a human soul that, save forthe most glimmering of contacts, was beyond the humanness of me.And the more I learned of Margaret Henan in the weeks that followedthe more mysteriously remote she became. She was as alien as afar-journeyer from some other star, and no hint could she nor allthe countryside give me of what forms of living, what heats offeeling, or rules of philosophic contemplation actuated her in allthat she had been and was."I wull be suvunty-two come Guid Friday a fortnight," she said inreply to my question."But you are an old woman to be doing this man's work, and a strongman's work at that," I insisted.Again she seemed to immerse herself in that atmosphere ofcontemplative eternity, and so strangely did it affect me that Ishould not have been surprised to have awaked a century or so laterand found her just beginning to enunciate her reply -"The work hoz tull be done, an' I am beholden tull no one.""But have you no children, no family, relations?""Oh, aye, a-plenty o' them, but they no see fut tull be helpun'me."She drew out her pipe for a moment, then added, with a nod of herhead toward the house, "I luv' wuth meself."I glanced at the house, straw-thatched and commodious, at the largestable, and at the large array of fields I knew must belong withthe place."It is a big bit of land for you to farm by yourself.""Oh, aye, a bug but, suvunty acres. Ut kept me old mon buzzy,along wuth a son an' a hired mon, tull say naught o' extra honds unthe harvest an' a maid-servant un the house."She clambered into the cart, gathered the reins in her hands, andquizzed me with her keen, shrewd eyes."Belike ye hail from over the watter - Ameruky, I'm meanun'?""Yes, I'm a Yankee," I answered."Ye wull no be findun' mony Island McGill folk stoppun' unAmeruky?""No; I don't remember ever meeting one, in the States."She nodded her head."They are home-luvun' bodies, though I wull no be sayin' they areno fair-travelled. Yet they come home ot the last, them oz are nolost ot sea or kult by fevers an' such-like un foreign parts.""Then your sons will have gone to sea and come home again?" Iqueried."Oh, aye, all savun' Samuel oz was drownded."At the mention of Samuel I could have sworn to a strange light inher eyes, and it seemed to me, as by some telepathic flash, that Idivined in her a tremendous wistfulness, an immense yearning. Itseemed to me that here was the key to her inscrutableness, the cluethat if followed properly would make all her strangeness plain. Itcame to me that here was a contact and that for the moment I wasglimpsing into the soul of her. The question was tickling on mytongue, but she forestalled me.She TCHK'D to the horse, and with a "Guid day tull you, sir," droveoff.A simple, homely people are the folk of Island McGill, and I doubtif a more sober, thrifty, and industrious folk is to be found inall the world. Meeting them abroad - and to meet them abroad onemust meet them on the sea, for a hybrid sea-faring and farmer breedare they - one would never take them to be Irish. Irish they claimto be, speaking of the North of Ireland with pride and sneering attheir Scottish brothers; yet Scotch they undoubtedly are,transplanted Scotch of long ago, it is true, but none the lessScotch, with a thousand traits, to say nothing of their tricks ofspeech and woolly utterance, which nothing less than their Scotchclannishness could have preserved to this late day.A narrow loch, scarcely half a mile wide, separates Island McGillfrom the mainland of Ireland; and, once across this loch, one findshimself in an entirely different country. The Scotch impression isstrong, and the people, to commence with, are Presbyterians. Whenit is considered that there is no public-house in all the islandand that seven thousand souls dwell therein, some idea may begained of the temperateness of the community. Wedded to old ways,public opinion and the ministers are powerful influences, whilefathers and mothers are revered and obeyed as in few other placesin this modern world. Courting lasts never later than ten atnight, and no girl walks out with her young man without herparents' knowledge and consent.The young men go down to the sea and sow their wild oats in thewicked ports, returning periodically, between voyages, to live theold intensive morality, to court till ten o'clock, to sit under theminister each Sunday, and to listen at home to the same sternprecepts that the elders preached to them from the time they wereladdies. Much they learned of women in the ends of the earth,these seafaring sons, yet a canny wisdom was theirs and they neverbrought wives home with them. The one solitary exception to thishad been the schoolmaster, who had been guilty of bringing a wifefrom half a mile the other side of the loch. For this he had neverbeen forgiven, and he rested under a cloud for the remainder of hisdays. At his death the wife went back across the loch to her ownpeople, and the blot on the escutcheon of Island McGill was erased.In the end the sailor-men married girls of their own homeland andsettled down to become exemplars of all the virtues for which theisland was noted.Island McGill was without a history. She boasted none of theevents that go to make history. There had never been any wearingof the green, any Fenian conspiracies, any land disturbances.There had been but one eviction, and that purely technical - a testcase, and on advice of the tenant's lawyer. So Island McGill waswithout annals. History had passed her by. She paid her taxes,acknowledged her crowned rulers, and left the world alone; all sheasked in return was that the world should leave her alone. Theworld was composed of two parts - Island McGill and the rest of it.And whatever was not Island McGill was outlandish and barbarian;and well she knew, for did not her seafaring sons bring home reportof that world and its ungodly ways?It was from the skipper of a Glasgow tramp, as passenger fromColombo to Rangoon, that I had first learned of the existence ofIsland McGill; and it was from him that I had carried the letterthat gave me entrance to the house of Mrs. Ross, widow of a mastermariner, with a daughter living with her and with two sons, mastermariners themselves and out upon the sea. Mrs. Ross did not takein boarders, and it was Captain Ross's letter alone that hadenabled me to get from her bed and board. In the evening, after myencounter with Margaret Henan, I questioned Mrs. Ross, and I knewon the instant that I had in truth stumbled upon mystery.Like all Island McGill folk, as I was soon to discover, Mrs. Rosswas at first averse to discussing Margaret Henan at all. Yet itwas from her I learned that evening that Margaret Henan had oncebeen one of the island belles. Herself the daughter of a well-to-do farmer, she had married Thomas Henan, equally well-to-do.Beyond the usual housewife's tasks she had never been accustomed towork. Unlike many of the island women, she had never lent a handin the fields."But what of her children?" I asked."Two o' the sons, Jamie an' Timothy uz married an' be goun' tullsea. Thot bug house close tull the post office uz Jamie's. Thedaughters thot ha' no married be luvun' wuth them as dud marry.An' the rest be dead.""The Samuels," Clara interpolated, with what I suspected was agiggle.She was Mrs. Ross's daughter, a strapping young woman with handsomefeatures and remarkably handsome black eyes."'Tuz naught to be smuckerun' ot," her mother reproved her."The Samuels?" I intervened. "I don't understand.""Her four sons thot died.""And were they all named Samuel?""Aye.""Strange," I commented in the lagging silence."Very strange," Mrs. Ross affirmed, proceeding stolidly with theknitting of the woollen singlet on her knees - one of the countlessunder-garments that she interminably knitted for her skipper sons."And it was only the Samuels that died?" I queried, in furtherattempt."The others luved," was the answer. "A fine fomuly - no finer onthe island. No better lods ever sailed out of Island McGill. Themunuster held them up oz models tull pottern after. Nor was ever awhusper breathed again' the girls.""But why is she left alone now in her old age?" I persisted. "Whydon't her own flesh and blood look after her? Why does she livealone? Don't they ever go to see her or care for her?""Never a one un twenty years an' more now. She fetched ut on tullherself. She drove them from the house just oz she drove old TomHenan, thot was her husband, tull hus death.""Drink?" I ventured.Mrs. Ross shook her head scornfully, as if drink was a weaknessbeneath the weakest of Island McGill.A long pause followed, during which Mrs. Ross knitted stolidly on,only nodding permission when Clara's young man, mate on one of theShire Line sailing ships, came to walk out with her. I studied thehalf-dozen ostrich eggs, hanging in the corner against the walllike a cluster of some monstrous fruit. On each shell were paintedprecipitous and impossible seas through which full-rigged shipsfoamed with a lack of perspective only equalled by their sharptechnical perfection. On the mantelpiece stood two large pearlshells, obviously a pair, intricately carved by the patient handsof New Caledonian convicts. In the centre of the mantel was astuffed bird-of-paradise, while about the room were scatteredgorgeous shells from the southern seas, delicate sprays of coralsprouting from barnacled PI-PI shells and cased in glass, assegaisfrom South Africa, stone axes from New Guinea, huge Alaskantobacco-pouches beaded with heraldic totem designs, a boomerangfrom Australia, divers ships in glass bottles, a cannibal KAI-KAIbowl from the Marquesas, and fragile cabinets from China and theIndies and inlaid with mother-of-pearl and precious woods.I gazed at this varied trove brought home by sailor sons, andpondered the mystery of Margaret Henan, who had driven her husbandto his death and been forsaken by all her kin. It was not thedrink. Then what was it? - some shocking cruelty? some amazinginfidelity? or some fearful, old-world peasant-crime?I broached my theories, but to all Mrs. Ross shook her head."Ut was no thot," she said. "Margaret was a guid wife an' a guidmother, an' I doubt she would harm a fly. She brought up herfomuly God-fearin' an' decent-minded. Her trouble was thot shetook lunatic - turned eediot."Mrs. Ross tapped significantly on her forehead to indicate a stateof addlement."But I talked with her this afternoon," I objected, "and I foundher a sensible woman - remarkably bright for one of her years.""Aye, an' I'm grantun' all thot you say," she went on calmly. "ButI am no referrun' tull thot. I am referrun' tull her wucked-headedan' vucious stubbornness. No more stubborn woman ever luv'd thanMargaret Henan. Ut was all on account o' Samuel, which was thename o' her youngest an' they do say her favourut brother - hum ozdied by hus own hond all through the munuster's mustake un noregisterun' the new church ot Dublin. Ut was a lesson thot thename was musfortunate, but she would no take ut, an' there was talkwhen she called her first child Samuel - hum thot died o' thecroup. An' wuth thot what does she do but call the next oneSamuel, an' hum only three when he fell un tull the tub o' hotwatter an' was plain cooked tull death. Ut all come, I tell you,o' her wucked-headed an' foolush stubbornness. For a Samuel shemust hov; an' ut was the death of the four of her sons. After thefirst, dudna her own mother go down un the dirt tull her feet, a-beggun' an' pleadun' wuth her no tull name her next one Samuel?But she was no tull be turned from her purpose. Margaret Henan wasalways set on her ways, an' never more so thon on thot name Samuel."She was fair lunatuc on Samuel. Dudna her neighbours' an' allkuth an' kun savun' them thot luv'd un the house wuth her, get upan' walk out ot the christenun' of the second - hum thot wascooked? Thot they dud, an' ot the very moment the munuster askedwhat would the bairn's name be. 'Samuel,' says she; an' wuth thotthey got up an' walked out an' left the house. An' ot the doordudna her Aunt Fannie, her mother's suster, turn an' say loud forall tull hear: 'What for wull she be wantun' tull murder the weething?' The munuster heard fine, an' dudna like ut, but, oz hetold my Larry afterward, what could he do? Ut was the woman'swush, an' there was no law again' a mother callun' her childaccordun' tull her wush."An' then was there no the third Samuel? An' when he was lost otsea off the Cape, dudna she break all laws o' nature tull hov afourth? She was forty-seven, I'm tellun' ye, an' she hod a childot forty-seven. Thunk on ut! Ot forty-seven! Ut was fairscand'lous."From Clara, next morning, I got the tale of Margaret Henan'sfavourite brother; and from here and there, in the week thatfollowed, I pieced together the tragedy of Margaret Henan. SamuelDundee had been the youngest of Margaret's four brothers, and, asClara told me, she had well-nigh worshipped him. He was going tosea at the time, skipper of one of the sailing ships of the BankLine, when he married Agnes Hewitt. She was described as a slenderwisp of a girl, delicately featured and with a nervous organizationof the supersensitive order. Theirs had been the first marriage inthe "new" church, and after a two-weeks' honeymoon Samuel hadkissed his bride good-bye and sailed in command of the Loughbank, abig four-masted barque.And it was because of the "new" church that the minister's blunderoccurred. Nor was it the blunder of the minister alone, as one ofthe elders later explained; for it was equally the blunder of thewhole Presbytery of Coughleen, which included fifteen churches onIsland McGill and the mainland. The old church, beyond repair, hadbeen torn down and the new one built on the original foundation.Looking upon the foundation-stones as similar to a ship's keel, itnever entered the minister's nor the Presbytery's head that the newchurch was legally any other than the old church."An' three couples was married the first week un the new church,"Clara said. "First of all, Samuel Dundee an' Agnes Hewitt; thenext day Albert Mahan an' Minnie Duncan; an' by the week-end EddieTroy and Flo Mackintosh - all sailor-men, an' un sux weeks' timethe last of them back tull their ships an' awa', an' no one o' themdreamin' of the wuckedness they'd been ot."The Imp of the Perverse must have chuckled at the situation. Allthings favoured. The marriages had taken place in the first weekof May, and it was not till three months later that the minister,as required by law, made his quarterly report to the civilauthorities in Dublin. Promptly came back the announcement thathis church had no legal existence, not being registered accordingto the law's demands. This was overcome by prompt registration;but the marriages were not to be so easily remedied. The threesailor husbands were away, and their wives, in short, were nottheir wives."But the munuster was no for alarmin' the bodies," said Clara. "Hekept hus council an' bided hus time, waitun' for the lods tull beback from sea. Oz luck would have ut, he was away across theisland tull a christenun' when Albert Mahan arrives homeonexpected, hus shup just docked ot Dublin. Ut's nine o'clock otnight when the munuster, un hus sluppers an' dressun'-gown, getsthe news. Up he jumps an' calls for horse an' saddle, an' awa' hegoes like the wund for Albert Mahan's. Albert uz just goun' tullbed an' hoz one shoe off when the munuster arrives."'Come wuth me, the pair o' ye,' says he, breathless-like. 'Whatfor, an' me dead weary an' goun' tull bed?' says Albert. 'Yull belawful married,' says the munuster. Albert looks black an' says,'Now, munuster, ye wull be jokun',' but tull humself, oz I've heardhum tell mony a time, he uz wonderun' thot the munuster should a-took tull whusky ot hus time o' life."'We be no married?' says Minnie. He shook his head. 'An' I om noMussus Mahan?' 'No,' says he, 'ye are no Mussus Mahan. Ye areplain Muss Duncan.' 'But ye married 'us yoursel',' says she. 'Idud an' I dudna,' says he. An' wuth thot he tells them the wholeupshot, an' Albert puts on hus shoe, an' they go wuth the munusteran' are married proper an' lawful, an' oz Albert Mahan saysafterward mony's the time, ''Tus no every mon thot hoz two weddun'nights on Island McGill.'"Six months later Eddie Troy came home and was promptly remarried.But Samuel Dundee was away on a three-years' voyage and his shipfell overdue. Further to complicate the situation, a baby boy,past two years old, was waiting for him in the arms of his wife.The months passed, and the wife grew thin with worrying. "Ut's nomeself I'm thunkun' on," she is reported to have said many times,"but ut's the puir fatherless bairn. Uf aught happened tull Samuelwhere wull the bairn stond?"Lloyd's posted the Loughbank as missing, and the owners ceased themonthly remittance of Samuel's half-pay to his wife. It was thequestion of the child's legitimacy that preyed on her mind, and,when all hope of Samuel's return was abandoned, she drowned herselfand the child in the loch. And here enters the greater tragedy.The Loughbank was not lost. By a series of sea disasters anddelays too interminable to relate, she had made one of those long,unsighted passages such as occur once or twice in half a century.How the Imp must have held both his sides! Back from the sea cameSamuel, and when they broke the news to him something else brokesomewhere in his heart or head. Next morning they found him wherehe had tried to kill himself across the grave of his wife andchild. Never in the history of Island McGill was there so fearfula death-bed. He spat in the minister's face and reviled him, anddied blaspheming so terribly that those that tended on him did sowith averted gaze and trembling hands.And, in the face of all this, Margaret Henan named her first childSamuel.How account for the woman's stubbornness? Or was it a morbidobsession that demanded a child of hers should be named Samuel?Her third child was a girl, named after herself, and the fourth wasa boy again. Despite the strokes of fate that had already berefther, and despite the loss of friends and relatives, she persistedin her resolve to name the child after her brother. She wasshunned at church by those who had grown up with her. Her mother,after a final appeal, left her house with the warning that if thechild were so named she would never speak to her again. And thoughthe old lady lived thirty-odd years longer she kept her word. Theminister agreed to christen the child any name but Samuel, andevery other minister on Island McGill refused to christen it by thename she had chosen. There was talk on the part of Margaret Henanof going to law at the time, but in the end she carried the childto Belfast and there had it christened Samuel.And then nothing happened. The whole island was confuted. The boygrew and prospered. The schoolmaster never ceased averring that itwas the brightest lad he had ever seen. Samuel had a splendidconstitution, a tremendous grip on life. To everybody's amazementhe escaped the usual run of childish afflictions. Measles,whooping-cough and mumps knew him not. He was armour-clad againstgerms, immune to all disease. Headaches and earaches were thingsunknown. "Never so much oz a boil or a pumple," as one of the oldbodies told me, ever marred his healthy skin. He broke schoolrecords in scholarship and athletics, and whipped every boy of hissize or years on Island McGill.It was a triumph for Margaret Henan. This paragon was hers, and itbore the cherished name. With the one exception of her mother,friends and relatives drifted back and acknowledged that they hadbeen mistaken; though there were old crones who still abided bytheir opinion and who shook their heads ominously over their cupsof tea. The boy was too wonderful to last. There was no escapingthe curse of the name his mother had wickedly laid upon him. Theyoung generation joined Margaret Henan in laughing at them, but theold crones continued to shake their heads.Other children followed. Margaret Henan's fifth was a boy, whomshe called Jamie, and in rapid succession followed three girls,Alice, Sara, and Nora, the boy Timothy, and two more girls,Florence and Katie. Katie was the last and eleventh, and MargaretHenan, at thirty-five, ceased from her exertions. She had donewell by Island McGill and the Queen. Nine healthy children werehers. All prospered. It seemed her ill-luck had shot its boltwith the deaths of her first two. Nine lived, and one of them wasnamed Samuel.Jamie elected to follow the sea, though it was not so much a matterof election as compulsion, for the eldest sons on Island McGillremained on the land, while all other sons went to the salt-ploughing. Timothy followed Jamie, and by the time the latter hadgot his first command, a steamer in the Bay trade out of Cardiff,Timothy was mate of a big sailing ship. Samuel, however, did nottake kindly to the soil. The farmer's life had no attraction forhim. His brothers went to sea, not out of desire, but because itwas the only way for them to gain their bread; and he, who had noneed to go, envied them when, returned from far voyages, they satby the kitchen fire, and told their bold tales of the wonderlandsbeyond the sea-rim.Samuel became a teacher, much to his father's disgust, and eventook extra certificates, going to Belfast for his examinations.When the old master retired, Samuel took over his school.Secretly, however, he studied navigation, and it was Margaret'sdelight when he sat by the kitchen fire, and, despite theirmaster's tickets, tangled up his brothers in the theoretics oftheir profession. Tom Henan alone was outraged when Samuel, schoolteacher, gentleman, and heir to the Henan farm, shipped to seabefore the mast. Margaret had an abiding faith in her son's star,and whatever he did she was sure was for the best. Like everythingelse connected with his glorious personality, there had never beenknown so swift a rise as in the case of Samuel. Barely with twoyears' sea experience before the mast, he was taken from theforecastle and made a provisional second mate. This occurred in afever port on the West Coast, and the committee of skippers thatexamined him agreed that he knew more of the science of navigationthan they had remembered or forgotten. Two years later he sailedfrom Liverpool, mate of the Starry Grace, with both master's andextra-master's tickets in his possession. And then it happened -the thing the old crones had been shaking their heads over foryears.It was told me by Gavin McNab, bos'n of the Starry Grace at thetime, himself an Island McGill man."Wull do I remember ut," he said. "We was runnin' our Eastun'down, an' makun' heavy weather of ut. Oz fine a sailor-mon oz everwalked was Samuel Henan. I remember the look of hum wull thot lastmarnun', a-watch-un' them bug seas curlun' up astern, an' a-watchun' the old girl an' seeun' how she took them - the skupperdown below an' drunkun' for days. Ut was ot seven thot Henanbrought her up on tull the wund, not darun' tull run longer on thotfearful sea. Ot eight, after havun' breakfast, he turns un, an' ahalf hour after up comes the skupper, bleary-eyed an' shaky an'holdun' on tull the companion. Ut was fair smokun', I om tellun'ye, an' there he stood, blunkun' an' noddun' an' talkun' tullhumsel'. 'Keep off,' says he ot last tull the mon ot the wheel.'My God!' says the second mate, standun' beside hum. The skuppernever looks tull hum ot all, but keeps on mutterun" an' jabberun'tull humsel'. All of a suddent-like he straightens up an' throwshus head back, an' says: 'Put your wheel over, me mon - now domnye! Are ye deef thot ye'll no be hearun' me?'"Ut was a drunken mon's luck, for the Starry Grace wore off aforethot God-Almighty gale wuthout shuppun' a bucket o' watter, thesecond mate shoutun' orders an' the crew jumpun' like mod. An'wuth thot the skupper nods contented-like tull humself an' goesbelow after more whusky. Ut was plain murder o' the lives o' allof us, for ut was no the time for the buggest shup afloat tull berunnun'. Run? Never hov I seen the like! Ut was beyond allthunkun', an' me goun' tull sea, boy an' men, for forty year. Itell you ut was fair awesome."The face o' the second mate was white oz death, an' he stood utalone for half an hour, when ut was too much for hum an' he wentbelow an' called Samuel an' the third. Aye, a fine sailor-mon thotSamuel, but ut was too much for hum. He looked an' studied, andlooked an' studied, but he could no see hus way. He durst na heavetull. She would ha' been sweeput o' all honds an' stucks an'everythung afore she could a-fetched up. There was naught tull dobut keep on runnun'. An' uf ut worsened we were lost ony way, forsoon or late that overtakun' sea was sure tull sweep us clear overpoop an' all."Dud I say ut was a God-Almighty gale? Ut was worse nor thot. Thedevil himself must ha' hod a hond un the brewun' o' ut, ut was thotfearsome. I ha' looked on some sights, but I om no carun' tulllook on the like o' thot again. No mon dared tull be un hus bunk.No, nor no mon on the decks. All honds of us stood on top thehouse an' held on an' watched. The three mates was on the poop,with two men ot the wheel, an' the only mon below was thot whusky-blighted captain snorun' drunk."An' then I see ut comun', a mile away, risun' above all the waveslike an island un the sea - the buggest wave ever I looked upon.The three mates stood tulgether an' watched ut comun', a-prayun'like we thot she would no break un passun' us. But ut was no tullbe. Ot the last, when she rose up like a mountain, curlun' abovethe stern an' blottun' out the sky, the mates scattered, the secondan' third runnun' for the mizzen-shrouds an' climbun' up, but thefirst runnun' tull the wheel tull lend a hond. He was a brave men,thot Samuel Henan. He run straight un tull the face o' thot fathero' all waves, no thunkun' on humself but thunkun' only o' the shup.The two men was lashed tull the wheel, but he would be ready tullhond un the case they was kult. An' then she took ut. We on thehouse could no see the poop for the thousand tons o' watter thothod hut ut. Thot wave cleaned them out, took everythung along wuthut - the two mates, climbun' up the mizzen-ruggun', Samuel Henanrunnun' tull the wheel, the two men ot the wheel, aye, an' thewheel utself. We never saw aught o' them, for she broached tullwhat o' the wheel goun', an' two men o' us was drownded off thehouse, no tull mention the carpenter thot we pucked up ot the breako' the poop wuth every bone o' hus body broke tull he was like somuch jelly."And here enters the marvel of it, the miraculous wonder of thatwoman's heroic spirit. Margaret Henan was forty-seven when thenews came home of the loss of Samuel; and it was not long afterthat the unbelievable rumour went around Island McGill. I sayunbelievable. Island McGill would not believe. Doctor Hall pooh-pooh'd it. Everybody laughed at it as a good joke. They tracedback the gossip to Sara Dack, servant to the Henans', and who alonelived with Margaret and her husband. But Sara Dack persisted inher assertion and was called a low-mouthed liar. One or two daredquestion Tom Henan himself, but beyond black looks and curses fortheir presumption they elicited nothing from him.The rumour died down, and the island fell to discussing in all itsramifications the loss of the Grenoble in the China seas, with allher officers and half her crew born and married on Island McGill.But the rumour would not stay down. Sara Dack was louder in herassertions, the looks Tom Henan cast about him were blacker thanever, and Dr. Hall, after a visit to the Henan house, no longerpooh-pooh'd. Then Island McGill sat up, and there was a tremendouswagging of tongues. It was unnatural and ungodly. The like hadnever been heard. And when, as time passed, the truth of SaraDack's utterances was manifest, the island folk decided, like thebos'n of the Starry Grace, that only the devil could have had ahand in so untoward a happening. And the infatuated woman, so SaraDack reported, insisted that it would be a boy. "Eleven bairns ha'I borne," she said; "sux o' them lossies an' five o' them loddies.An' sunce there be balance un all thungs, so wull there be balancewuth me. Sux o' one an' half a dozen o' the other - there uz thebalance, an' oz sure oz the sun rises un the marnun', thot surewull ut be a boy."And boy it was, and a prodigy. Dr. Hall raved about itsunblemished perfection and massive strength, and wrote a brochureon it for the Dublin Medical Society as the most interesting caseof the sort in his long career. When Sara Dack gave the babe'sunbelievable weight, Island McGill refused to believe and onceagain called her liar. But when Doctor Hall attested that he hadhimself weighed it and seen it tip that very notch, Island McGillheld its breath and accepted whatever report Sara Dack made of theinfant's progress or appetite. And once again Margaret Henancarried a babe to Belfast and had it christened Samuel."Oz good oz gold ut was," said Sara Dack to me.Sara, at the time I met her, was a buxom, phlegmatic spinster ofsixty, equipped with an experience so tragic and unusual thatthough her tongue ran on for decades its output would still be ofimperishable interest to her cronies."Oz good oz good," said Sara Dack. "Ut never fretted. Sut ut downun the sun by the hour an' never a sound ut would make oz long ozut was no hungered! An' thot strong! The grup o' uts honds waslike a mon's. I mind me, when ut was but hours old, ut grupped meso mighty thot I fetched a scream I was thot frightened. Ut wasthe punk o' health. Ut slept an' ate, an' grew. Ut neverbothered. Never a night's sleep ut lost tull no one, nor ever amunut's, an' thot wuth cuttin' uts teeth an' all. An' Margaretwould dandle ut on her knee an' ask was there ever so fine a loddieun the three Kungdoms."The way ut grew! Ut was un keepun' wuth the way ut ate. Ot ayear ut was the size o' a bairn of two. Ut was slow tull walk an'talk. Exceptun' for gurgly noises un uts throat an' for creepun'on all fours, ut dudna monage much un the walkun' an' talkun' line.But thot was tull be expected from the way ut grew. Ut all wenttull growun' strong an' healthy. An' even old Tom Henan cheered upot the might of ut an' said was there ever the like o' ut un thethree Kungdoms. Ut was Doctor Hall thot first suspicioned, I mindme well, though ut was luttle I dreamt what he was up tull ot thetime. I seehum holdun' thungs' un fronto' luttle Sammy's eyes, an'a-makun' noises, loud an' soft, an' far an' near, un luttle Sammy'sears. An' then I see Doctor Hall go away, wrunklun' hus eyebrowsan' shakun' hus head like the bairn was ailun'. But he was noailun', oz I could swear tull, me a-seeun' hum eat an' grow. ButDoctor Hall no said a word tull Margaret an' I was no for guessun'the why he was sore puzzled."I mind me when luttle Sammy first spoke. He was two years old an'the size of a child o five, though he could no monage the walkun'yet but went around on all fours, happy an' contented-like an'makun' no trouble oz long oz he was fed promptly, which was onusualoften. I was hangun' the wash on the line ot the time when out hecomes, on all fours, hus bug head waggun' tull an' fro an' blunkun'un the sun. An' then, suddent, he talked. I was thot took a-backI near died o' fright, an' fine I knew ut then, the shakun' o'Doctor Hall's head. Talked? Never a bairn on Island McGill talkedso loud an' tull such purpose. There was no mustakun' ut. I stoodthere all tremblun' an' shakun'. Little Sammy was brayun'. I tellyou, sir, he was brayun' like an ass - just like thot, - loud an'long an' cheerful tull ut seemed hus lungs ud crack."He was a eediot - a great, awful, monster eediot. Ut was after hetalked thot Doctor Hall told Margaret, but she would no believe.Ut would all come right, she said. Ut was growun' too fast foraught else. Guv ut time, said she, an' we would see. But old TomHenan knew, an' he never held up hus head again. He could no abidethe thung, an' would no brung humsel' tull touch ut, though I om nodenyun' he was fair fascinated by ut. Mony the time, I see humwatchun' of ut around a corner, lookun' ot ut tull hus eyes fairbulged wuth the horror; an' when ut brayed old Tom ud stuck husfungers tull hus ears an' look thot miserable I could a-puttiedhum."An' bray ut could! Ut was the only thung ut could do besides eatan' grow. Whenever ut was hungry ut brayed, an' there was nostoppun' ut save wuth food. An' always of a marnun', when first utcrawled tull the kutchen-door an' blunked out ot the sun, utbrayed. An' ut was brayun' that brought about uts end."I mind me well. Ut was three years old an' oz bug oz a led o'ten. Old Tom hed been goun' from bed tull worse, ploughun' up an'down the fields an' talkun' an' mutterun' tull humself. On themarnun' o' the day I mind me, he was suttun' on the bench outsidethe kutchen, a-futtun' the handle tull a puck-axe. Unbeknown, themonster eediot crawled tull the door an' brayed after hus fashionot the sun. I see old Tom start up an' look. An' there was themonster eediot, waggun' uts bug head an' blunkun' an' brayun' likethe great bug ass ut was. Ut was too much for Tom. Somethun' wentwrong wuth hum suddent-like. He jumped tull hus feet an' fetchedthe puck-handle down on the monster eediot's head. An' he hut utagain an' again like ut was a mod dog an' hum afeard o' ut. An' hewent straight tull the stable an' hung humsel' tull a rafter. An'I was no for stoppun' on after such-like, an' I went tull stayalong wuth me suster thot was married tull John Martin an'comfortable-off."I sat on the bench by the kitchen door and regarded Margaret Henan,while with her callous thumb she pressed down the live fire of herpipe and gazed out across the twilight-sombred fields. It was thevery bench Tom Henan had sat upon that last sanguinary day of life.And Margaret sat in the doorway where the monster, blinking at thesun, had so often wagged its head and brayed. We had been talkingfor an hour, she with that slow certitude of eternity that sobefitted her; and, for the life of me, I could lay no finger on themotives that ran through the tangled warp and woof of her. Was shea martyr to Truth? Did she have it in her to worship at soabstract a shrine? Had she conceived Abstract Truth to be the onehigh goal of human endeavour on that day of long ago when she namedher first-born Samuel? Or was hers the stubborn obstinacy of theox? the fixity of purpose of the balky horse? the stolidity of theself-willed peasant-mind? Was it whim or fancy? - the one streakof lunacy in what was otherwise an eminently rational mind? Or,reverting, was hers the spirit of a Bruno? Was she convinced ofthe intellectual rightness of the stand she had taken? Was hers asteady, enlightened opposition to superstition? or - and a subtlerthought - was she mastered by some vaster, profounder superstition,a fetish-worship of which the Alpha and the Omega was the crypticSAMUEL?"Wull ye be tellun' me," she said, "thot uf the second Samuel hodbeen named Larry thot he would no hov fell un the hot watter an'drownded? Atween you an' me, sir, an' ye are untellugent-lookun'tull the eye, would the name hov made ut onyways dufferent? Wouldthe washun' no be done thot day uf he hod been Larry or Michael?Would hot watter no be hot, an' would hot watter no burn uf he hodhod ony other name but Samuel?"I acknowledged the justice of her contention, and she went on."Do a wee but of a name change the plans o' God? Do the world runby hut or muss, an' be God a weak, shully-shallyun' creature thotud alter the fate an' destiny o' thungs because the worm MargaretHenan seen fut tull name her bairn Samuel? There be my son Jamie.He wull no sign a Rooshan-Funn un hus crew because o' believun'thot Rooshan-Funns do be monajun' the wunds an' hov the makun' o'bod weather. Wull you be thunkun' so? Wull you be thunkun' thotGod thot makes the wunds tull blow wull bend Hus head from on hightull lussen tull the word o' a greasy Rooshan-Funn un some dirtyshup's fo'c'sle?"I said no, certainly not; but she was not to be set aside frompressing home the point of her argument."Then wull you be thunkun' thot God thot directs the stars un theircourses, an' tull whose mighty foot the world uz but a footstool,wull you be thunkun' thot He wull take a spite again' MargaretHenan an' send a bug wave off the Cape tull wash her son un tulleternity, all because she was for namun' hum Samuel?""But why Samuel?" I asked."An' thot I dinna know. I wantud ut so.""But WHY did you want it so?""An' uz ut me thot would be answerun' a such-like question? Bethere ony mon luvun' or dead thot can answer? Who can tell the WHYo' like? My Jamie was fair daft on buttermilk, he would drunk uttull, oz he said humself, hus back teeth was awash. But my Tumothycould no abide buttermilk. I like tull lussen tull the thundergrowlun' an' roarun', an' rampajun'. My Katie could no abide thenoise of ut, but must scream an' flutter an' go runnun' for themudmost o' a feather-bed. Never yet hov I heard the answer tullthe WHY o' like, God alone hoz thot answer. You an' me be mortalan' we canna know. Enough for us tull know what we like an' whatwe duslike. I LIKE - thot uz the first word an' the last. An'behind thot like no men can go an' find the WHY o' ut. I LIKESamuel, an' I like ut well. Ut uz a sweet name, an' there be arollun' wonder un the sound o' ut thot passes onderstandun'."The twilight deepened, and in the silence I gazed upon thatsplendid dome of a forehead which time could not mar, at the widthbetween the eyes, and at the eyes themselves - clear, out-looking,and wide-seeing. She rose to her feet with an air of dismissingme, saying -"Ut wull be a dark walk home, an' there wull be more thon asprunkle o' wet un the sky.""Have you any regrets, Margaret Henan?" I asked, suddenly andwithout forethought.She studied me a moment."Aye, thot I no ha' borne another son.""And you would . . .?" I faltered."Aye, thot I would," she answered. "Ut would ha' been hus name."I went down the dark road between the hawthorn hedges puzzling overthe why of like, repeating SAMUEL to myself and aloud and listeningto the rolling wonder in its sound that had charmed her soul andled her life in tragic places. SAMUEL! There was a rolling wonderin the sound. Aye, there was!
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