"Please," said Priscilla, speaking very gently. "It's not his fault."

"He has sprained his ankle," said Sir Lucius. "He can't walk."

"Oh," said Lord Torrington. "Sprained ankle, is it?"

He turned and walked back to the lawn. Sir Lucius followed him.

"Rather a bear, I call him," said Priscilla. "But, of course, he may be one of those cases of a heart of gold inside a rough skin. You can't be sure. We did 'As You Like It' last Christmas—dramatic club, you know—and Sylvia Courtney had a bit to say about a toad ugly and venomous which yet wears a precious jewel in his head. I'd say he's just the opposite. If there is a precious jewel—and there may be—it's not in his head. Anyhow one great comfort is that he doesn't remember spraining your ankle."

Frank, who recollected Lord Torrington with disagreeable distinctness, did not find any great comfort in being totally forgotten. He would have liked, though he scarcely expected, some expression of regret that the accident had occurred.

"It'll be all the easier," said Priscilla, "to pay him back if he hasn't any suspicion that we have an undying vendetta against him. I rather like vendettas, don't you? There's something rather noble in the idea of pursuing a man with implacable vengeance from generation to generation."

"I don't quite see," said Frank, "what good a vendetta is. We can't do anything while he's in your father's house. It wouldn't be right."

"All the same," said Priscilla, "well score off him. For the immediate present we've got to wait and watch his every movement with glittering eyes and cynical smiles concealed behind our ingenuous brows. You needn't say 'ingenuous' isn't a real word, because it is. I put it in an English comp. last term and got full marks, which shows that it must be a good word."

Priscilla was right in supposing that she would not be allowed to dine in the dining-room. Frank faced the banquet without her support. It was not a very pleasant meal for him. Lady Torrington shook hands with him and asked him whether he were the boy whom she had heard reciting a prize poem on the last Speech Day at Winchester. Frank told her that he was at Haileybury.

"I thought it might have been you," said Lady Torrington, "because I seem to remember your face. I must have seen you somewhere, I suppose."

She took no further notice of him during dinner. Lord Torrington took no notice of him at all. The dinner was long and, in spite of the fact that he had a good appetite, Frank did not enjoy himself. He was extremely glad when Lady Torrington and Miss Lentaigne left the dining-room. He was casting about for a convenient excuse for escape when Sir Lucius spoke to him.

"You and Priscilla were out on the bay all day, I suppose?"

"Yes," said Frank, "we started early and sailed about."

"I daresay you'll be able to give us some information then," said Sir Lucius. "Shall I ask him a few questions, Torrington? The police sergeant said——"

"The police sergeant is a damned fool," said Lord Torrington. "She can't be going about in a boat. She doesn't know how to row."

"Frank," said Sir Lucius, "did you and Priscilla happen to see anything of a young lady——"

"You may just as well tell him the story," said Lord Torrington. "It'll be in the papers in a day or two if we can't find her."

"Very well, Torrington. Just as you like. The fact is, Frank, that Lord Torrington is here looking for his daughter, who has——well, a week ago she disappeared."

"Disappeared!" said Lord Torrington. "Why not say bolted?"

"Ran away from home," said Sir Lucius.

"According to your aunt——" said Lord Torrington.

"She's not my aunt," said Frank.

"Oh, isn't she?" Lord Torrington's tone suggested that this was a distinct advantage to Frank. "According to Miss Lentaigne then, the girl has asserted her right to live her own life untrammelled by the fetters of conventionality. That's the way she put it, isn't it, Lentaigne?"

"Lady Isabel," said Sir Lucius, "came over to Ireland. We know that."

"Booked her luggage in advance from Euston," said Lord Torrington, "under another name. I had a detective on the job, and he worried that out. Women are all going mad nowadays; though I had no notion Isabel went in for—well, the kind of thing your sister talks, Lentaigne. I thought she was religious. She used to be perpetually going to church, evensong on the Vigil of St. Euphrosyne, and that kind of thing, but I am told lots of parsons now have taken up these advanced ideas about women. It may have been in church she heard them."

"From Dublin," said Sir Lucius, "she came on here. The police sergeant——"

"Who's a dunderheaded fool," said Lord Torrington.

"He says there's a young lady going about the bay for the last two days in a boat."

"That's the wrong tack altogether," said Lord Torrington. "Isabel would never think of going in a boat. I tell you she can't row."

"Now, Frank," said Sir Lucius, "did you see or hear anything of her?"

Frank would have liked very much to deny that he had seen any lady. His dislike of Lord Torrington was strong in him. He had been snubbed in the train, injured while leaving the steamer, and actually insulted that very afternoon. He felt, besides, the strongest sympathy with any daughter who ran away from a home ruled by Lord and Lady Torrington. But he had been asked a straight question and it was not in him to tell a lie deliberately.

"We did meet a lady," he said, "in fact we lunched with her today, but her name was Rutherford."

"Was she rowing about alone in a boat?" said Lord Torrington.

"She had a boy to row her," said Frank. "She'd hired the boat. She said she came from the British Museum and was collecting sponges."

"Sponges!" said Sir Lucius. "How could she collect sponges here, and what does the British Museum want sponges for?"

"They weren't exactly sponges," said Frank, "they were zoophytes."

"It's just possible," said Lord Torrington, "that she might—Sponges, you say? I don't know what would put sponges into her head. But, of course, she had to say something. What was she like to look at?"

"She had a dark blue dress," said Frank, "and was tallish."

"Fuzzy fair hair?" said Lord Torrington.

"I don't remember her hair."

"Slim?"

"I'd call Miss Rutherford fat," said Frank. "At least, she's decidedly stout."

"Not her," said Lord Torrington. "Nobody could call Isabel fat. That police sergeant of yours is a fool, Lentaigne. I always said he was. If Isabel is in this neighbourhood at all she's living in some country inn."

"The sergeant said he'd make inquiries about the lady he mentioned," said Sir Lucius. "We shall hear more about her tomorrow."

"She had a Primus stove with her," said Frank.

"That's no help," said Lord Torrington. "Anybody might have a Primus stove."

"She said she'd borrowed it from Professor Wilder," said Frank.

"Who the devil is Professor Wilder?"

"He's doing the rotifers," said Frank. "At least Miss Rutherford said he was. I don't know who he is."

"That's not Isabel," said Lord Torrington. "She wouldn't have the intelligence to invent a professor who collected rotifers. I don't suppose she ever heard of rotifers. I never did. What are they?"

"Insects, I fancy," said Sir Lucius. "I daresay Priscilla would know. Shall I send for her?"

"No," said Lord Torrington. "I don't care what rotifers are. Let's finish our cigars outside, Lentaigne. It's infernally hot."

Frank had finished his cigarette. He had no wish to spend any time beyond what was absolutely necessary in Lord Torrington's company. He felt sure that Lord Torrington would insist on walking briskly up and down when he got outside. Frank could not walk briskly, even with the aid of two sticks. He made up his mind to hobble off in search of Priscilla. He found her, after some painful journeyings, in a most unlikely place. She was sitting in the long gallery with Lady Torrington and Miss Lentaigne. The two ladies reclined in easy chairs in front of an open window. There were several partially smoked cigarettes in a china saucer on the floor beside Miss Lentaigne. Lady Torrington was fanning herself with a slow motion which reminded Frank of the way in which a tiger, caged in a zoological garden, switches its tail after being fed. Priscilla sat in the background under a lamp. She had chosen a straight-backed chair which stood opposite a writing table. She sat bolt upright in it with her hands folded on her lap and her left foot crossed over her right Her face wore a look of slightly puzzled, but on the whole intelligent interest; such as a humble dependent might feel while submitting to instruction kindly imparted by some very eminent person. She wore a white frock, trimmed with embroidery, of a perfectly simple kind. She had a light blue sash round her waist. Her hair, which was very sleek, was tied with a light blue ribbon. Round her neck, on a third light blue ribbon, much narrower than either of the other two, hung a tiny gold locket shaped like a heart. She turned as Frank entered the room and met his gaze of astonishment with a look of extreme innocence. Her eyes made him think for a moment of those of a lamb, a puppy or other young animal which is half-frightened, half-curious at the happening of something altogether outside of its previous experience.

Neither of the ladies at the window took any notice of Frank's entrance. He hobbled across the room and sat down beside Priscilla. She got up at once and, without looking at him, walked demurely to the chair on which Miss Lentaigne was sitting.

"Please, Aunt Juliet," she said, "may I go to bed? I think it's time."

Miss Lentaigne looked at her a little doubtfully. She had known Priscilla for many years and had learned to be particularly suspicious of meekness.

"I heard the stable clock strike," said Priscilla. "It's half-past nine."

"Very well," said Miss Lentaigne. "Good-night."

Priscilla kissed her aunt lightly on her left cheek bone. Then she held out her hand to Lady Torrington.

"You may kiss me," said the lady. "You seem to be a very quiet well behaved little girl."

Priscilla kissed Lady Torrington and then passed on to Frank.

"Good-night, Cousin Frank," she said. "I hope you're not tired after being out in the boat, and I hope your ankle will be better tomorrow."

Her eyes still had an expression of cherubic innocence; but just as she let go Frank's hand she winked abruptly. He found as she turned away, that she had left something in his hand. He unfolded a small, much crumpled piece of blotting paper, taken, he supposed, by stealth from the writing table beside Priscilla's chair. A note was scratched with a point of a pin on the blotting paper.

"Come to the shrubbery, ten sharp. Most important. Excuse scratching. No pencil."

"Priscilla," said Lady Torrington, "is a sweet child, very subdued and modest."

Frank's attention was arrested by the silvery sweetness of the tone in which she spoke. He had a feeling that she meant to convey to Miss Lentaigne something more than her words implied. Miss Lentaigne struck a match noisily and lit another cigarette.

"She may be a little wanting in animation," said Lady Torrington, "but that is a fault which one can forgive nowadays when so many girls run into the opposite extreme and become self-assertive."

"Priscilla," said Miss Lentaigne, "is not always quite so good as she was this evening."

"You must be quite pleased that she isn't," said Lady Torrington, with a deliberate, soft smile. "With your ideas about the independence of our sex I can quite understand that Priscilla, if she were always as quiet and gentle as she was this evening, would be trying, very trying."

Frank became acutely uncomfortable. He had entered the room noisily enough, hobbling on his two sticks; but neither lady seemed to be aware of his presence. He began to feel as if he were eavesdropping, listening to a conversation which he was not intended to hear. He hesitated for a moment, wondering whether he ought to say a formal good-night, or get out of the room as quietly as he could without calling attention to his presence. Miss Lentaigne's next remark decided him.

"Your own daughter," she said, "seems to have imbibed some of our more modern ideas. That must be a trial to you, Lady Torrington."

Frank got up and made his way out of the room without speaking.



CHAPTER XVI

To reach the corner of the shrubbery it was necessary to cross the lawn. Lord Torrington and Sir Lucius, having lit fresh cigars, were pacing up and down in earnest conversation. Frank hobbled across their path and received a kindly greeting from his uncle.

"Well, Frank, out for a breath of fresh air before turning in? Sorry you can't join our march. Lord Torrington is just talking about your father."

"Thanks, Uncle Lucius," said Frank, "but I can't walk. There's a hammock chair in the corner. I'll sit there for a while and smoke another cigarette."

Sir Lucius and Lord Torrington walked briskly, turning each time they reached the edge of the grass and walking briskly back again. Frank realised that Priscilla, if she was to keep her appointment, must cross their track. He watched anxiously for her appearance. The stable clock struck ten. In the shadow of the verandah in front of the dining-room window Frank fancied he saw a moving figure. Sir Lucius and Lord Torrington crossed the lawn again. Half-way across they were exactly opposite the dining-room window, A few steps further on and the direct line between the window and a corner of the shrubbery lay behind them. Priscilla seized the most favourable moment for her passage. Just as the two men reached the point at which their backs were turned to the line of her crossing she darted forward. Half-way across she seemed to trip, hesitated for a moment and then ran on. Before the walkers reached their place of turning she was safe in a laurel bush beside Frank's chair.

"My shoe," she whispered. "It came off slap in the middle of the lawn. I always knew those were perfectly beastly shoes. It was Sylvia Courtney made me buy them, though I told her at the time they'd never stick on, and what good are shoes if they don't Now they are sure to see it; though perhaps they won't If they don't I can make another dart and get it."

To avoid all risk of the loss of the second shoe Priscilla took it off before she started. Lord Torrington and Sir Lucius crossed the lawn again. It seemed as if one or other of them must tread on the shoe which lay on their path; but they passed it by. Priscilla seized her chance, rushed to the middle of the lawn and returned again successfully. Then she and Frank retreated, for the sake of greater security, into the middle of the shrubbery.

"Everything's all right," said Priscilla. "I've got lots and lots of food stored away. I simply looted the dishes as they were brought out of the dining-room. Fried fish, a whole roast duck, three herrings' roes on toast, half a caramel pudding—I squeezed it into an old jam pot—and several other things. We can start at any hour we like tomorrow and it won't in the least matter whether Brannigan's is open or not. What do you say to 6 a.m.?"

"I'm not going on the bay tomorrow."

"You must. Why not?"

"Because I want to score off that old beast who sprained my ankle."

The prefect in Frank had entirely disappeared. Two days of close companionship with Priscilla erased the marks made on his character by four long years of training at Haileybury. His respect for constituted authorities had vanished. The fact that Lord Torrington was Secretary of State for War did not weigh on him for an instant. He was, as indeed boys ought to be at seventeen years of age, a primitive barbarian. He was filled with a desire for revenge on the man who had insulted and injured him.

"You don't know," he said, "what Lord Torrington is here for."

"Oh, yes, I do," said Priscilla. "I'm not quite an ass. I was listening to Aunt Juliet and Lady Torrington shooting barbed arrows at each other after dinner. Aunt Juliet got rather the worst of it, I must say. Lady Torrington is one of those people whose garments smell of myrrh, aloes and cassia, and yet whose words are very swords, you know the sort I mean."

"Lord Torrington is chasing his daughter," said Frank, "who has run away from home. I vote we find her first and then help her to hide."

"Of course. That's what we're going to do. That's why we're going off in the boat tomorrow."

"But she's not on the bay," said Frank. "Miss Rutherford is too fat to be her. He said so."

"Who's talking about Miss Rutherford? She's simply sponge-hunting. Nobody but a fool would think she was Miss Torrington."

"Lady Isabel," said Frank. "He's a marquis."

"Anyhow she's not the escaped daughter."

"Then who is?"

"The lady spy, of course. Any one could see that at a glance."

"But she has a man with her. Lord Torrington said—"

"If you can call that thing a man," said Priscilla, "she has. That's her husband. She's run away with him and got married surreptitiously, like young Lochinvar. People do that sort of thing, you know. I can't imagine where the fun comes in; but it's quite common, so I suppose it must be considered pleasant. Anyhow Sylvia Courtney says that English literature is simply stock full of most beautiful poems about people who do it; all more or less true, so there must be some attraction."

Frank made no reply. Priscilla's theory was new to him. It seemed to have a certain plausibility. He wanted to think it over before committing himself to accepting it.

"It's not a thing I'd care to do myself," said Priscilla. "But then people are so different. What strikes me as rather idiotic may be sweeter than butter in the mouth to somebody else. You never can tell beforehand. Anyhow we can count on Aunt Juliet as a firm ally. She can't go back on us on account of her principles."

This was another new idea to Frank. He began to feel slightly bewildered.

"The one thing she's really keen on just at present," said Priscilla, "is that women should assert their independence and not be mere tame parasites in gilded cages. That's what she said to Lady Torrington anyhow. So of course she's bound to help us all she can, so long as she doesn't know that they're married, and nobody does know that yet except you and me. Not that I'd be inclined to trust Aunt Juliet unless we have to; but it's a comfort to know she's there if the worst comes to the worst."

"What do you intend to do?" said Frank.

"Find them first. If we start off early tomorrow well probably get to Curraunbeg before they're up. My idea would be to hand over the young man to Miss Rutherford for a day or two. She's sure to be somewhere about and when she understands the circumstances she won't mind pretending that he, the original spy, I mean, is her husband, just for a while, until the first rancour of the pursuit has died away. She strikes me as an awfully good sort who won't mind. She may even like it Some people love being married. I can't imagine why; but they do. Anyhow I don't expect there'll be any difficulty about that part of the programme. We'll simply tranship him, tent and all, into Jimmy Kinsella's boat."

"I don't see the good of doing all that," said Frank.

"Why not——?"

"The good of it is this. We must keep Aunt Juliet on our side in case of accidents. She's got a most acute mind and will throw all kinds of obstacles in the way of the pursuers. As long as she thinks that Miss Torrington—Lady Isabel, I mean—is really going in for leading a beautiful scarlet kind of life of her own; but if she once finds out that she's gone and got married to a man, any man, even one who can't manage a boat, she'll be keener than any one else to have her dragged back."

"What do you mean to do with her?" said Frank.

"We'll plant her down on Inishbawn. That's the safest place in the whole bay for her to be. Of course Joseph Antony Kinsella will object; but we'll make him see that it's his duty to succor the oppressed, and anyhow we'll land her there and leave her. I don't exactly know what it is that they're doing on that island, though I can guess. But whatever it is you may bet your hat they won't let Lord Torrington or the police or any one of that kind within a mile of it. If once we get her there she's safe from her enemies. Every man, woman and child in the neighbourhood will combine to keep that sanctuary—bother! there's a word which exactly expresses what a sanctuary is kept; but I've forgotten what it is. I came across it once in a book and looked it out in the dict. to see what it meant. It's used about sanctuaries and secrets. Do you remember what it is?"

Frank did not give his mind to the question. He was thinking, with some pleasure, of the baffled rage of Lord Torrington when he was not allowed to land on Inishbawn. Lady Isabel would be plainly visible sitting at the door of her tent on the green slope of the island. Lord Torrington, with violent language bursting from him, would approach the island in a boat, anticipating a triumphant capture. But Joseph Antony Kinsella would sally like a rover from his anchorage and tow Lord Torrington's boat off to some distant place. With invincible determination the War Lord would return again. From every inhabited island in the bay would issue boats, Flanagan's old one among them. They would surround Lord Torrington, hustle and push him away. Children from cottage doors would jeer at him. Peter Walsh and Patsy, the drunken smith, would add their taunts to the chorus when at last, baffled and despairing, he landed at the quay. The vision was singularly attractive. Frank ran his hand over his bandaged ankle and smiled with joy.

"I know it's used of secrets as well as sanctuaries," said Priscilla, "because Aunt Juliet used to say it about the Confessional when she was thinking of being a Roman Catholic. I told you about that, didn't I?"

"No," said Frank. "But will they be able to stop him landing, really?"

"Of course they will. That was one of the worst times we ever had with Aunt Juliet. Father simply hated it, expecting the blow to fall every day, especially after she took to fasting frightfully hard with finnan haddocks. That was just after the time she was tremendously down on all religion and wouldn't let him have prayers in the morning, which he didn't mind as much; though, of course, he pretended. Fortunately she found out about uric acid just before she actually did the deed, so that was all right. It always is in the end, you know. That's one of the really good points about Aunt Juliet. All the same I wish I could remember that word."

"I don't quite see," said Frank, "how they'll stop him landing on Inishbawn if he wants to."

"Nor do I; but they will. If Peter Walsh and Joseph Antony Kinsella and Flanagan and Patsy the smith—they're all in the game, whatever it is—if they determine not to let him land on Inishbawn he won't land there."

"But even if they keep him off for a day or two they can't for ever."

"Well," said Priscilla, "he can't stay here for ever either. There's sure to be a war soon and then he'll jolly well have to go back to London and see after it. You told me it was his business to look after wars, so of course he must. Now that we've got everything settled I'll sneak off again and get to bed. If I recollect that word during the night I'll write it down."

Priscilla, leaving Frank to make his own way back to the house as best he could, crept through the laurel bushes to the edge of the lawn. Lord Torrington and Sir Lucius had gone indoors. She could see them through the open window of the long gallery. She stole carefully across the lawn and entered the house by way of the dining-room window. She went very quietly to her bedroom. Before undressing she opened her wardrobe, lifted out two dresses which lay folded on a shelf and took out the store of provisions which she had secured at dinner time. She wrapped up the duck and the fish in paper, nice white paper taken from the bottoms of the drawers in her dressing table. The herrings' roes on toast, originally a savoury, she put in the bottom of the soap dish and tied a piece of paper over the top of it. The caramel pudding rather overflowed the jam pot. It was impossible to press it down below the level of the rim. Priscilla sliced off the bulging excess of it with the handle of her tooth brush and dropped it into her mouth. Then she tied some paper over the top of the jam pot, and wrote, "pudding" across it with a blue pencil. The remainder of her spoil—some rolls, two artichokes and a sweetbread—she wrapped up together.

Then she undressed and got into bed. Half an hour later she woke suddenly. Without a moment's hesitation she got out of bed and lit a candle. The blue pencil was still lying on top of the jam pot which stood on the dressing table. Priscilla took it, and to avoid all possibility of mistake in the morning, wrote word "inviolable" on every one of her parcels.



CHAPTER XVII

It was ten o'clock in the forenoon. Peter Walsh, having breakfasted, strolled down the street towards the quay. When he reached it he surveyed the boats which lay there with a long, deliberate stare. The Blue Wanderer was at her moorings. The Tortoise, with a new iron on her rudder, had gone out at seven o'clock. There were three boats from the islands and one large hooker lying at the quay. Peter Walsh made quite sure that there was nothing which called for comment or investigation in the appearance of any of these. Then he lit his pipe and took his seat on one of the windows of Brannigan's shop. Four out of the six habitues of this meeting place were already seated. Peter Walsh made the fifth. The sixth man had not yet arrived.

At half past ten Timothy Sweeny left his shop and walked down to the quay. Timothy Sweeny, though not the richest, was the most important man in Rosnacree. His public house was in a back street and the amount of business which he did was insignificant compared to that done by Brannigan. But he was a politician of great influence and had been made a Justice of the Peace by a government anxious to popularise the administration of the law in Ireland. The law itself, as was recognised on all sides, could not possibly be made to command the respect of any one; but it was hoped that it might excite less active hostility if it were modified to suit the public convenience by men like Sweeny who had some personal experience of the unpleasantness of the penalties which it ordained.

It was seldom that Timothy Sweeny left his shop. He was a man of corpulent figure and flabby muscles. He disliked the smell of fresh air and walking was a trouble to him. The five loafers on Brannigan's window sills looked at him with some amazement when he approached them.

"Is Peter Walsh here?" said Sweeny.

"I am here," said Peter Walsh. "Where else would I be?"

"I'd be glad," said Sweeny, "if you'd step up to my house with me for two minutes the way I could speak to you without the whole town listening to what we're saying."

Peter Walsh rose from his seat with quiet dignity and followed Sweeny up the street.

"You'll take a sup of porter," said Sweeny, when they reached the bar of the public house.

Peter finished the half pint which was offered to him at a draught.

"They tell me," said Sweeny, "that the police sergeant was up at the big house again this morning. I don't know if it's true but it's what they're after telling me."

"It is true," said Peter. "I'll say that much for whoever it was that told you. It's true enough. The sergeant was off last night after dark. He thinks he's damned smart that sergeant, and it was after dark he went the way nobody would see him; but he was seen, for Patsy the smith was on the side of the road, mortal sick after the way that Joseph Antony Kinsella made him turn to making a rudder iron and him as drunk at the time as any man ever you seen. It was him told me about the sergeant and where he went last night."

"Well," said Sweeny, "and what did he tell you?"

"He told me that the sergeant went along the road till he met with the gentleman that does be going about the country and has the two ladies with him, the one of them that might be his wife and the other has Jimmy Kinsella engaged to row her round the bay while she'd be bathing."

"There's too many going round the country and the bay and that's a fact. We could do with less."

"We could, surely. But there's no harm in them ones. What the sergeant said to the gentleman Patsy the smith couldn't hear but it was maybe half an hour after when the sergeant went home again and he had a look on him like a man that was middling well satisfied. Patsy the smith saw him for he was in the ditch when he passed, terrible sick, retching the way he thought the whole of his liver would be out on the road before he'd done. Well, there was no more happened last night; but it wasn't more than nine o'clock this morning before that same sergeant was off up to the big house and I wouldn't wonder but it was to tell the strange gentleman that's there whatever it was he heard him last night. He had that kind of a look about him anyway."

"I don't like the way things is going on," said Sweeny. "What is it that's up at the big house at all?"

"They tell me," said Walsh, "that he's a mighty high up gentleman whoever he is."

"He may be, but I'd be glad if I knew what he's doing here, for I don't like the looks of him."

Patsy the smith, pallid after the experience of the night before, walked into the shop.

"If Peter Walsh is there," he said, "the sergeant is down about the quay looking for him."

"You better go to him," said Sweeny, "and mind now what you say to him."

"You'll not say much," said Patsy the smith, "for he'll have you whipped off into one of the cells in the barrack before you've time to speak. He's terrible determined."

Patsy's face was yellow—a witness to the fact that his liver was still in him—and he was inclined to take a pessimistic view of life. Peter Walsh paid no attention to his prophecy. Sweeny looked anxious.

The sergeant was standing outside the door of Bran-nigan's shop. He accosted Peter Walsh as soon as he caught sight of him.

"Sir Lucius bid me tell you," he said, "that you're to have the Tortoise ready for him at twelve o'clock, and that his lordship will be going with him, so he won't be needing you in the boat."

"It would fail me to do that," said Peter, "for she's out, Miss Priscilla and the young gentleman with the sore leg has her."

"Sir Lucius was partly in doubt," said the sergeant, "but it might be the way you say, for I told him myself that the boat was gone. But his lordship wouldn't be put off, and you're to hire another boat."

"What boat?"

"It was Joseph Antony Kinsella's he mentioned," said the sergeant, "when I told him it was likely he'd be in with another load of gravel. But sure one boat's as good as another so long as it is a boat. His lordship wouldn't be turned aside from going."

"Them ones," said Peter Walsh, "must have their own way whatever happens. It's pleasure sailing they're for, I'm thinking, among the islands?"

"It might be," said the sergeant "I didn't ask."

"You could guess though."

"And if I could, do you think I'd tell you? It's too fond of asking questions you are, Peter Walsh, about what doesn't concern you."

The sergeant turned his back and walked away. Peter Walsh watched him enter the barrack. Then he himself went back to Sweeny's shop.

"They're wanting a boat," he said. "Joseph Antony Kinsella's or another."

"And what for?"

"Unless it's to go out to Inishbawn," said Peter, "I don't know what for."

"Bedamn then," said Sweeny, "there's no boat for them."

"I was thinking that myself."

"I wouldn't wonder," said Sweeney, "but something might stop Joseph Antony Kinsella from coming in today after all, thought he's due with another load of gravel."

"He mightn't come," said Patsy the smith. "There's many a thing could happen to prevent him."

"What time were they thinking of starting?" said Sweeny.

"Twelve o'clock," said Peter Walsh.

"Patsy," said Sweeny, "let you take Brannigan's old punt and go down as far as the stone perch to try can you see Joseph Antony Kinsella coming in."

Patsy the smith was in a condition of great physical misery; but the occasion demanded energy and self-sacrifice. He staggered down to the slip, loosed the mooring rope of Brannigan's dilapidated punt and drove her slowly down the harbour, waggling one oar over her stern.

"Let you go round the town," said Sweeny to Peter Walsh, "and find out where the fellows is that came in with the boats that's at the quay this minute. It's time they were off out of this."

Peter Walsh left the shop. In a minute or two he came back again.

"There's Miss Priscilla's boat," he said, "the Blue Wanderer. You're forgetting her."

"They'd never venture as far as Inishbawn in her," said Sweeny.

"They might then. The wind's east and she'd run out easy enough under the little lug."

"They'd have to row back."

"The likes of them ones," said Peter Walsh, "wouldn't think about how they'd get back till the time came. I'm uneasy about that boat, so I am."

"Tell me this now," said Sweeny, after a moment's consideration. "Did the young lady say e'er a word to you about giving the boat a fresh lick of paint?"

"She did not. Why would she? Amn't I just after painting the boat?"

"Are you sure now she didn't say she'd be the better of another coat?"

"She might then, some time that I wouldn't be paying much attention to what she said. I'm a terrible one to disremember things anyway."

"You'd better do it then," said Sweeny. "There's plenty of the same paint you had before in Brannigan's, and it will do the boat no harm to get a lick with it."

Peter Walsh left the shop again and walked in a careless way down the street. Sweeny followed him at a little distance and spoke to the men who were sitting on Brannigan's window sills. They rose at once and walked down to the slip. In a few minutes the Blue Wanderer was dragged from her moorings and carried up to a glassy patch of waste land at the end of the quay. Her floor boards were taken out of her, her oars, rudder and mast were laid on the grass. The boat herself was turned bottom upwards."

In the course of the next half hour the owners of the boats which lay alongside the quay sauntered down one by one. Brown lugsails were run up on the smaller boats. The mainsail of the hooker was slowly hoisted. At half past eleven there was not a single boat of any kind left afloat in the harbour. Peter Walsh, his coat off and his sleeves rolled up, was laying long stripes of green paint on the already shining bottom of the Blue Wanderer. He worked with the greatest zeal and earnestness. Timothy Sweeny looked at the empty harbour with satisfaction. Then he went back to the shop and dosed comfortably behind his bar.

Patsy the smith stood in the stern of the punt and waggled his oar with force and skill. He disliked taking this kind of exercise very much indeed. His nature craved for copious, cooling drafts of porter, drawn straight from the cask and served in large thick tumblers. He had intended to spend the morning in taking this kind of refreshment The day was exceedingly hot. When he reached the end of the quay his mouth was quite dry inside and his legs were shaking under him. He looked round with eyes which were strikingly bloodshot. There was no sign of Joseph Antony Kinsella's boat on the long stretch of water between him and the stone perch. If he could have articulated at all he would have sworn. Being unable to swear he groaned deeply and took his oar again. The punt wobbled forward very much as a fat duck walks.

When he reached Delgipish he looked round again. A mile out beyond the stone perch he saw a boat moving slowly towards him. His eyes served him badly and although he could see the splash of the oars in the water he could not make out who the rower was. A man of weaker character, suffering the same physical torture, would have allowed himself to drift on the shore of Delginish and there would have awaited the coming of the boat he had seen. But Patsy the smith was brave. He was also nerved by the extreme importance of his mission. It was absolutely necessary that something should happen to prevent Joseph Antony bringing his boat to Rosnacree harbour. The sight of one brown sail and then another stealing round the end of the quay gave him fresh courage. Timothy Sweeny and Peter Walsh had done their work on shore. He was determined not to fail in carrying through his part of a masterly scheme.

For twenty minutes Patsy the smith sculled on. It seemed to him sometimes as if each sway of his body, each tug of his tired arms must be the last possible. Yet he succeeded in going on. He dared not look round lest the boat he had seen should prove after all not to be the one he sought. Such a disappointment would, he knew, be more than he could bear. At last the splash of oars reached his ears and he heard himself hailed by name. The voice was Kinsella's. The relief was too much for Patsy. He sat down on the thwart behind him and was violently sick. Kinsella laid his boat alongside the punt and looked calmly at his friend. Not until the worst spasms were over did he speak.

"Faith, Patsy," he said, "it must have been a terrible drenching you gave yourself last night, and the stuff was good too, as good as ever I seen. What has you in the state you're in at all?"

The sickness had to some extent revived Patsy the smith. He was able to speak, though with difficulty.

"Go back out of that," he said.

"And why would I go back?"

"Timothy Sweeny says you're to go back, for if you come in to the quay today there'll be the devil and all if not worse."

"If that's the way of it I will go back; but I'd be glad, so I would, if I knew what Sweeny means by it. It's a poor thing to be breaking my back rowing a boatload of gravel all the way from Inishbawn and then to be told to turn round and go back; and just now too, when the wind has dropped and it's beginning to look mighty black over to the eastward."

"You're to go back," said Patsy, "because the strange gentleman that's up at the big house is wanting your boat."

"Let him want!"

"He'll get it, if so be that you go in to the quay, and when he has it the first thing he'll do is to go out to Inishbawn. It's there he wants to be and it's yourself knows best what he'd find if he got there. Go back, I tell you."

"If you'll take my advice," said Kinsella, "you will go back yourself. There's thunder beyond there coming up, and there'll be a breeze setting towards it from the west before another ten minutes is over our heads. I don't know will you care for that in the state you're in this minute, with that old punt and only one oar. The tide'll be running strong against the breeze and there'll be a kick-up at the stone perch."

Patsy the smith saw the wisdom of this advice. Tired as he was he seized his one oar and began sculling home. Kinsella watched him go and then did a peculiar thing. He took the shovel which lay amidships in his boat and began to heave his cargo of gravel into the sea. As he worked a faint breeze from the west rose, fanned him and died away. Another succeeded it and then another. Kinsella looked round him. The four boats which had drifted out from the quay before the easterly breeze of the morning, had hauled in their sheets. They were awaiting a wind from the west. The heavy purple thunder cloud was rapidly climbing the sky. Kinsella shovelled hard at his gravel. His boat, lightened of her load, rose in the water, showing inch by inch more free board. A steady breeze from the west succeeded the light occasional puffs. It increased in strength. The four boats inside him stooped to it. They sped across and across the channel towards the stone perch in short tacks. Kinsella hoisted his sail and took the tiller. The boat swung up into the wind and coursed away to the south west, close hauled to a stiff west wind. The thunder cloud burst over Rosnacree.

Sir Lucius and Lord Torrington drove into the town and pulled up in front of Brannigan's shop at a quarter to twelve. They looked round the empty harbour in some surprise. Sir Lucius went at once into the shop. Lord Torrington, being an Englishman with a proper belief in the forces of law and order, walked a few yards back and entered the police barracks.

"Brannigan," said Sir Lucius, "where's my boat? and where's that ruffian Peter Walsh?"

"Your boat, is it?" said Brannigan.

"I sent down word to Peter Walsh to have her ready for me at twelve, or, if my daughter had taken her out——"

"It would be better," said Brannigan, "if you were to see Peter Walsh yourself. Sure I don't know what's happened to your boat."

"Where's Peter Walsh?"

"He's down at the end of the quay putting an extra coat of paint on Miss Priscilla's boat I don't know what sense there is in doing the like, but of course he wouldn't care to go contrary to what the young lady might say."

Sir Lucius left the shop abruptly. At the door he ran into Lord Torrington and the police sergeant.

"Damn it all, Lentaigne," said Lord Torrington, "how are we going to get out?"

"There was boats in it," said the police sergeant, "plenty of them, when I gave your lordship's message to Peter Walsh."

"Where are they now?" said Lord Torrington. "What's the good of telling me they were here when they're not?"

The police sergeant looked cautiously round.

"I wouldn't say," he said at last, "but they're gone out of it, every one of the whole lot of them."

Peter Walsh, his paint brush in his hand, and an expression of respectful regret, on his face, came up to Sir Lucius and touched his hat.

"What's the meaning of this?" said Sir Lucius. "Didn't I send you word to have a boat, either my own or some other, ready for me at twelve?"

"The message the sergeant gave me," said Peter Walsh, "was to engage Joseph Antony Kinsella's boat for your honour if so be that Miss Priscilla had your own took out."

"And why the devil didn't you?" said Lord Torrington.

"Because she's not in it, your honour; nor hasn't been this day. I was waiting for her and the minute she came to the quay I'd have been in her, helping Joseph Antony to shovel out the gravel the way she'd be fit for two gentlemen like yourselves to go in her."

"Is there no other boat to be got?" said Lord Torrington.

"Launch Miss Priscilla's at once," said Sir Lucius.

"Sure the paint's wet on the bottom of her."

"Launch her," said Sir Lucius, "paint or not paint."

"I'll launch her if your honour bids me," said Peter Walsh. "But what use will she be to you when she's in the water? She'll not work to windward for you under the little lug that's in her, and it's from the west the wind's coming now."

He looked round the sky as he spoke.

"Glory be to God!" he said. "Will you look at what's coming. There's thunder in it and maybe worse."

Sir Lucius took Lord Torrington by the arm and led him out of earshot of the police sergeant and Peter Walsh.

"We'd better not go today, Torrington. There's a thunder storm coming. We'd simply get drenched."

"I don't care if I am drenched."

"And besides we can't go. There isn't a boat. We couldn't get anywhere in that little thing of Priscilla's. After all if she's on an island today she'll be there tomorrow."

"If that fool of a sergeant told us the truth this morning," said Lord Torrington, "and there's some man with her I want to break every bone in his body as soon as I can."

"He'll be there tomorrow," said Sir Lucius, "and I'll see that there's a boat here to take us out."



CHAPTER XVIII

Priscilla and Frank left the quay at half past seven against a tide which was still rising, but with a pleasant easterly breeze behind them. Once past the stone perch Priscilla set the boat on her course for Craggeen and gave the tiller to Frank. She herself pulled a spinnaker from beneath the stern sheets and explained to Frank that when she had hoisted it the boat's speed would be considerably increased. Then she made him uncomfortable by hitting him several times in different parts of the body with a long spar which she called the spinnaker boom.

The setting of this sail struck Frank as an immensely complicated business. He watched Priscilla working with a whole series of ropes and admired her skill greatly, until it occurred to him that she was not very sure of what she was doing. A rope, which she had made fast with some care close beside him, had to be cast loose, carried forward, passed outside a stay, and then made fast again. There appeared to be three corners to the spinnaker, and all three were hooked turn about on the end of the boom. Even when the third was unhooked again and the one which had been tried first restored to its place Priscilla seemed a little dissatisfied with the result. Another of the three corners was caught and held by the clip-hooks on the end of the halliard. Priscilla moused these carefully, explaining why she did so, and then found that she had to cut the mousing and catch the remaining corner of the sail with the hooks. When at last she triumphantly hoisted it the thing went up in a kind of bundle. Its own sheet was wrapped round it twice, and a jib sheet which had somehow wandered away from its proper place got twined round and round the boom which remained immovable near the mast. Priscilla surveyed the result of her work with a puzzled frown. Then she lowered the sail and turned to Frank.

"I thoroughly understand spinnakers," she said, "in theory. I don't suppose that there's a single thing known about them that I don't know. But they're beastly confusing things when you come to deal with them in practical life. Lots of other things are like that. It's exactly the same with algebra. I expect I've told you that I simply loathe algebra. Well, that's the reason. I understand it all right, but when it comes to doing it, it comes out just like that spinnaker. However it doesn't really matter. That's the great comfort about most things. You get on quite well enough without them, though of course you would get on better with, if you could do them."

The Tortoise did in fact slip along at a very satisfactory pace in spite of the lightness of the wind. It was just half past eight when they reached the mouth of the bay in which they had lunched the day before with Miss Rutherford.

"I feel rather," said Priscilla, "as if I could do with a little breakfast There's no use going on shore. Let's anchor and eat what we want in the boat."

Frank who was very hungry agreed at once. He rounded the boat up into the wind and Priscilla flung the anchor overboard. Then she picked her parcels one by one from the folds of the spinnaker in which they had wrapped themselves.

"It won't do," she said, "to eat everything today at the first go off the way we did yesterday. Specially as we've promised to give Miss Rutherford luncheon. The duck, for instance, had better be kept."

She laid the duck down again and covered it, a little regretfully, with the spinnaker. She took up the jampot which contained the caramel pudding. Her face brightened as she looked at it.

"By the way, Cousin Frank," she said. "That word is inviolable."

"That word?"

"The sanctuary and secret word," said Priscilla. "Don't you remember I couldn't get it last night But I did after I went to sleep which was jolly lucky. I hopped up at once and wrote it down. Now we know what Inishbawn will be for Lady Torrington's poor daughter when we get her there. All the same I don't think we'd better eat the caramel pudding at breakfast It mightn't be wholesome for you at this hour—on account of your sprained ankle, I mean, and not being accustomed to puddings at breakfast. Besides I expect Miss Rutherford would rather like it. What do you say to starting with an artichoke each?"

Frank was ready to start with anything that was given him. He ate the artichoke greedily and felt hardly less hungry when he had finished it. Priscilla too seemed unsatisfied. She said that they had perhaps made a mistake in beginning with the artichokes. But her sense of duty and her instinct for hospitality triumphed over her appetite. Feeling that temptation might prove overpowering, she put the slices of cold fish out of sight under the spinnaker with the remark that they ought to be kept for Miss Rutherford. She and Frank ate the herrings' roes on toast, the sweetbread and one of the four rolls. Then though Frank still looked hungry, Priscilla hoisted the foresail and hauled up the anchor.

They reached the passage past Craggeen when the tide was at the full and threaded their way among the rocks successfully. They passed into the wide water of Finilaun roads. A long reach lay before them and the wind had begun to die down as the tide turned. Priscilla, leaving Frank to steer, settled herself comfortably on the weather side of the boat between the centreboard case and the gunwale. Far down to leeward another boat was slipping across the roads towards the south. She had an old stained jib and an obtrusively new mainsail which shone dazzlingly white in the sun. Priscilla watched her with idle interest for some time. Then she announced that she was Flanagan's new boat.

"He bought the calico for the sail at Brannigan's," she said, "and made it himself. Peter Walsh told me that. I'm bound to say it doesn't sit badly; but of course you can't really tell about the sit of a sail when the boat's off the wind. I'd like to see it when she's close-hauled. That's the way with lots of other things besides sails. I dare say now that Lord Torrington is quite an agreeable sort of man when his daughter isn't running away."

"I'm sure he's not," said Frank.

"You can't be sure," said Priscilla. "Nobody could, except of course Lady Torrington and she doesn't seem to me the sort of person who's much cowed in her own house. I wish you'd heard her going for Aunt Juliet last night, most politely, but every word she said had what's called in French a 'double entendre' wrapped up in it. That means——"

"I know what it means," said Frank.

"That's all right then. I thought perhaps you wouldn't. I always heard they rather despised French at boys' schools, which is idiotic of course and may not be true."

Frank recollected a form master with whom, at one stage of his career at school he used to study the adventures of the innocent Telemaque. This gentleman refused to read aloud or allow his class to read aloud the text of the book, alleging that no one who did not suffer from a malformation of the mouth could pronounce French properly. Still even this master must have attached some meaning to the phrase "double entendre," though he might not have used it in precisely Priscilla's sense.

"Flanagan has probably been over to Curraunbeg," said Priscilla, "to see how his old boat is looking. After what Jimmy Kinsella is sure to have told him about the way they're treating her he's naturally a bit anxious. I wonder will he have the nerve to charge them anything extra at the end for dilapidations. It's curious now that we don't see the tents on Curraunbeg. I saw them yesterday from Craggeen. Perhaps they've moved round to the other side of the island."

"There's a boat coming out from behind the point now," said Frank. "Perhaps they're moving again."

Priscilla leaned over the gunwale and stared long at the boat which Frank pointed out.

"There's a man and a woman in her," he said.

"It's not Flanagan's old boat though," said Priscilla. "I rather think it's Jimmy Kinsella. I hope Miss Rutherford hasn't been hunting them on her own, under the impression that they're German spies. We oughtn't to have told her that. She's so frightfully impulsive you can't tell what she'd do."

Jimmy Kinsella had recognised the Tortoise shortly after he rounded the point of Curraunbeg. He dropped his lug sail and began to row up to windward evidently meaning to get within speaking distance of Priscilla. The boats approached each other at an angle. Miss Rutherford stood up in the stern of hers, waved a pocket handkerchief and shouted. Priscilla shouted in reply. Frank threw the Tortoise up into the wind and Jimmy Kinsella pulled alongside.

"They've gone," said Miss Rutherford. "They've escaped you again."

"You've frightened them away," said Priscilla. "I wish you wouldn't."

"No," said Miss Rutherford, "I didn't Honour bright! They'd gone before I got there. The people on the island said they packed up early this morning and when they saw Flanagan passing in his new boat they hailed him and got him to take them off."

"Wasn't that the boat we saw just now?" said Frank.

"Yes," said Priscilla. "Frightfully annoying, isn't it?"

"Never mind," said Miss Rutherford. "I know where they're gone. The people on the island told me. To Inishminna. Wasn't Inishminna the name, Jimmy?"

"It was, Miss."

"Climb on board," said Priscilla. "That is to say if you want to come. We must be after them at once. We'll follow Flanagan. Jimmy can row through Craggeen passage and pick you up afterwards."

Miss Rutherford tumbled from her own boat into the Tortoise.

"Thanks awfully," she said. "I want to see you arrest those spies more than anything."

"They're not spies," said Priscilla.

"We never really thought they were," said Frank.

"The truth is——" said Priscilla.

She stopped abruptly and looked round. Jimmy Kinsella was some distance astern heading for Craggeen. He appeared to be quite out of earshot. Nevertheless Priscilla lowered her voice to a whisper.

"We're on an errand of mercy," she said.

"Oh," said Miss Rutherford, "not vengeance. I'm disappointed."

"Mercy is a much nicer thing," said Priscilla, "besides being more Christian."

"All the same," said Miss Rutherford, "I'm disappointed. Vengeance is far more exciting."

"To a certain extent," said Priscilla, "we're taking vengeance too. At least Frank is, on account of his ankle you know. So you needn't be disappointed."

"That cheers me up a little," said Miss Rutherford, "but do explain."

"It's quite simple really," said Priscilla. "Though it may seem a little complicated. You explain, Cousin Frank, and be sure to begin at the beginning or she won't understand."

"Lord Torrington," said Frank, "is Secretary of State for War, and his daughter, Lady Isabel—but perhaps I'd better tell you first that as I was coming over to Ireland I met——"

"'Now who be ye would cross Lochgyle," said Priscilla, waving her hands towards the sea, "'this dark and stormy water?'"

"'Oh I'm the chief of Ulva's Isle, and this Lord Ullin's daughter.' You know that poem, I suppose."

"I've known it for years," said Miss Rutherford.

"Well, thats it," said Priscilla. "You have the whole thing now."

"I see," said Miss Rutherford, "I see it all now, or almost all. This is far better than spies. How did you ever think of it?"

"It's true," said Priscilla.

"Lord Torrington," said Frank, "is over here stopping with my uncle, and he came specially to find his daughter who's run away."

"'One lovely hand stretched out for aid,'" said Priscilla, "'and one was round her lover.' That's what we want to avoid if we can. I call that an errand of mercy. Don't you?"

"It's far and away the most merciful errand I ever heard of," said Miss Rutherford. "But why don't you hurry? At any moment now her father's men may reach the shore."

"We can't," said Priscilla, "hurry any more than we are. The wind's dropping every minute. Luff her a little bit, Frank, or she won't clear the point. The tide's taking us down, and that point runs out a terrific distance."

"The only thing I don't quite see yet," said Miss Rutherford, "is where the vengeance comes in."

"That's to be taken on her father," said Priscilla.

"Quite right," said Miss Rutherford, "as a matter of abstract justice; but I rather gathered from the way you spoke, Priscilla, that Frank had some kind of private feud with the old gentleman."

"He shoved me off the end of the steamer's gangway," said Frank, "and sprained my ankle. He has never so much as said he was sorry."

"Good," said Miss Rutherford. "Now our consciences are absolutely clear. What we are going to do is to carry off the blushing bride to some distant island."

"Inishbawn," said Priscilla.

The Tortoise had slipped through the passage at the south end of Finislaun. She was moving very slowly across another stretch of open water. On her lee bow lay Inishbawn. The island differs from most others in the bay in being twin. Instead of one there are two green mounds linked together by a long ridge of grey boulders. Tides sweep furiously round the two horns of it, but the water inside is calm and sheltered from any wind except one from the south east On the slope of the northern hill stands the Kinsellas' cottage, with certain patches of cultivated land around it. The southern hill is bare pasture land roamed over by bullocks and a few sheep which in stormy weather or night cross the stony isthmus to seek companionship and shelter near the cottage.

"Isn't that Inishbawn?" said Miss Rutherford. "Jimmy Kinsella told me it was the day I first met you."

"That's it," said Priscilla, "that's where we mean to put her."

"It's not half far enough away," said Miss Rutherford. "Lord Ullin or Torrington or whatever lord it is will quite easily follow her there. We must go much further, right out into the west to High Brasail, where lovers are ever young and angry fathers do not come."

"Inishbawn will do all right," said Priscilla.

"Priscilla says," said Frank, "that the people won't let Lord Torrington land on Inishbawn."

"They certainly seemed to have some objection to letting any one land," said Miss Rutherford. "Every time I suggested going there Jimmy has headed me oflf with one excuse or another."

"They have very good reasons," said Priscilla. "I have more or less idea what they are; but of course I can't tell you. It's never right to tell other people's secrets unless you're perfectly sure that you know them yourself, and I'm not sure. You hardly ever can be unless you happen to be one of the people that has the secret and in this case I'm not."

"I don't want to ask embarrassing questions," said Miss Rutherford, "though I'm almost consumed with curiosity about the secret. But are you quite sure that it's of a kind that will really prevent Lord Torrington landing there?"

"Quite absolutely, dead, cock sure," said Priscilla. "If I'm right about the secret and I think I am, though of course it's quite possible that I may not be, but if I am there isn't a man about the bay who wouldn't die a thousand miserable deaths rather than let Lord Torrington and the police sergeant land on that island."

"Then all we've got to do," said Miss Rutherford, "is to get her there and she's safe."

Priscilla hurriedly turned over the corner of the spinnaker and got out the jam pot. She glanced at its paper cover.

"Inishbawn is an inviolable sanctuary," she said. "What a mercy it is that I wrote down that word last night. I had forgotten it again. It's a desperately hard word to remember."

"It's a very good word," said Miss Rutherford.

"It's useful anyhow," said Priscilla. "In fact, considering what we're going to do I don't see how we could very well get on without it. I suppose it's rather too early to have luncheon."

"It's only half past eleven," said Frank, "but——"

"I breakfasted early," said Miss Rutherford.

"We scarcely breakfasted at all," said Frank.

"All right," said Priscilla, "the wind's gone hopelessly. It's much too hot to row, so I suppose we may as well have luncheon though it's not the proper time."

"Let us shake ourselves free of the wretched conventions of ordinary civilisation," said Miss Rutherford. "Let us eat when we are hungry without regard to the clock. Let us gorge ourselves with California peach juice. Let us suck the burning peppermint—"

"We haven't any today," said Priscilla. "Brannigan's wasn't open when we started."

"The principle is just the same," said Miss Rutherford. "Whatever food you have is sure to be refreshingly unusual."



CHAPTER XIX

The Tortoise lay absolutely becalmed. The ebbing tide carried her slowly past Inishbawn towards the deep passage between the end of the breakwater of boulders and the point on which the lighthouse stands. The air was extraordinarily close and oppressive. Even Priscilla seemed affected by it. She lay against the side of the boat with her hands trailing idly in the water. Frank sat with the useless tiller in his hand and watched the boom swing slowly across as the boat swayed this way or that with the current. Miss Rutherford, her face glistening with heat, had gone to sleep in a most uncomfortable attitude soon after luncheon. Her head nodded backwards from time to time and whenever it did so she opened her eyes, smiled at Frank, rearranged herself a little and then went to sleep again.

The cattle on Inishbawn had forsaken their scanty pasture and stood knee-deep in the sea. Not even the wild new heifer, which had gored Jimmy Kinsella, if such a creature existed at all, would have had energy to do much. A dog, which ought perhaps to have been barking at the cattle, lay prostrate under the shadow afforded by a grassy bank. A flock of white terns floated motionless a few yards from the Tortoise, looking like a miniature fleet of graceful, white-sailed pleasure boats. They had no heart to go circling and swooping for fish.

Perhaps it would have been useless if they had. The fish themselves may well have been lying, in search of coolness among the weedy stones at the bottom of the sea. Of all living creatures the jelly fish alone seemed to retain any spirit. Immense crowds of them drifted past the Tortoise, swelling out and closing again their concave bodies, revolving slowly round, dragging long purple tendrils deliriously through the warm water. They swept past Priscilla's drooping hands, touching them with their yielding bodies and brushing them softly with their tendrils. Now and then she lifted one from the water, watched it lie flaccid on the palm of her hand and then dropped it into the sea again.

A faint air of wind stole across from Inishbawn. The Tortoise, utterly without steerage way, felt it and turned slowly towards it. It was as if she stretched her head out for another such gentle kiss as the wind gave her. Priscilla felt it, and with returning animation made a plunge for an unusually large jelly fish, captured it and held it up triumphantly.

"It's a pity you're not out after jelly fish, Miss Rutherford," she said, "instead of sponges. There are thousands and thousands of them. We could fill the boat with them in half an hour."

Miss Rutherford made no reply. She had succeeded in wriggling herself into such a position that her head rested on the thwart of the boat. Her face was extremely red, and, owing perhaps to the twisted position of her neck, she was snoring. Priscilla looked at Frank and smiled.

"I wonder," she said, "if we ought to wake her up. She won't like it, of course, but it may be the kindest thing to do. It wouldn't be at all nice for her if she smothered in her sleep."

Frank blinked lazily. He was very nearly asleep.

"You're a nice pair," said Priscilla. "What on earth is the point of dropping off like that in the middle of the day? Ghastly laziness I call it."

Another puff of wind and then another came from the west. The Tortoise began to move through the water. Frank woke up and paid serious attention to his steering. Priscilla looked round the sea and then the sky. The thunder storm was breaking over Rosnacree, five miles to the east, and a heavy bank of dark clouds was piled up across the sky.

"It looks uncommonly queer," said Priscilla, "rather magnificent in some ways, but I wish I knew exactly what it's going to do. I don't understand this breeze coming in from the west. It's freshening too."

A long deep growl reached them from the east.

"Thunder," said Frank.

"Must be," said Priscilla. "The clouds are coming up against the wind. Only thunder does that—and liberty. At least Wordsworth says liberty does. I never saw it myself. I told you we were doing 'The Excursion' last term. It's in that somewhere. I say, this breeze is freshening. Keep her just as she's going, Cousin Frank. We'll be able to let her go in a minute. Oh, do look at the water!"

The sea had turned a deep purple colour. In spite of the ripples which the westerly breeze raised on its surface it had a curious look of sulky menace.

"Miss Rutherford," said Priscilla, "wake up, we're going to have a thunder storm."

Miss Rutherford sat up with a start

"A storm!" she said. "How splendid! Any chance of being wrecked?"

"Not at present," said Priscilla, "but you never know what may happen. If you feel at all nervous I'll steer myself."

"Nervous!" said Miss Rutherford. "I'm delighted. There's nothing I should like more than to be wrecked on a desert island with you two. It would just complete the most glorious series of adventures I've ever had. Do try and get wrecked."

"Hadn't we better go in to Inishbawn and wait till it's over?" said Frank.

"Nonsense," said Priscilla. "Wetting won't hurt us, and anyway we'll be at Inishminna in half an hour with this breeze."

The Tortoise was racing through the dark water. She was listed over so that her lee gunwale seemed likely to dip under. Miss Rutherford, in spite of her wish for shipwreck, scrambled up to windward. They reached the point of Ardilaun and fled, bending and staggering, down the narrow passage between it and Inishlean. Priscilla took the mainsheet in her hand and ordered Frank to luff a little. There was another period of rushing, heavily listed, with the wind fair abeam. Now and then, as a squall struck the sails, Priscilla let the mainsheet run out and allowed the Tortoise to right herself. The sea was flecked with the white tops of short, steep waves, raised hurriedly, as it were irritably by the wind. A few heavy drops of rain fell. The whole sky became very dark. A bright zig-zag of light flashed down, the thunder crashed over head. The rain came down like a solid sheet of water.

"Let her away again now," said Priscilla. "We can run right down on Inishark. Be ready to round her up into the wind when I tell you. I daren't jibe her."

"Don't," said Frank. "I say, you'd better steer."

"Can't now. We couldn't possibly change places. Are you all right, Miss Rutherford?"

"Splendid. Couldn't be better. I'm soaked to the skin. Can't possibly be any wetter even if we swim for it."

Inishark loomed, a low dark mass under their bow, dimly seen through a veil of blinding rain which fell so heavily that the floor boards under their feet were already awash.

"We'll have to bail in a minute or two if this goes on," said Priscilla. "I wonder where the tin is?"

A roar of thunder drowned her voice. Miss Rutherford and Frank saw her gesticulate wildly and point towards the island. Two small patches of white were to be seen near the shore.

"Their tents," yelled Priscilla. "We have them now if we don't sink. Luff her up, Cousin Frank, luff her up for all you're worth. We must get her off on the other tack or we'll be past them."

She hauled on the mainsheet as she spoke. The Tortoise rounded up into the wind, lay over till the water began to pour over her side, righted herself again and stood suddenly on an even keel, her sails flapping wildly, the boat herself trembling like a creature desperately frightened. Then she fell off on her new tack. Priscilla dragged Miss Rutherford up to windward. Frank, guided by instinct rather than by any knowledge of what was happening, scrambled up past the end of the long tiller. Priscilla let the main sheet run out again. The Tortoise raced straight for the shore.

"Keep her as she's going, Cousin Frank. I'll get the sail off her."

For a minute or two there was wild confusion. Priscilla treading on Miss Rutherford without remorse or apology, struggled with the halyard. The sail bellied hugely, dipped into the sea to leeward and was hauled desperately on board. The rain streamed down on them, each drop starting up again like a miniature fountain when it splashed upon the wood of the boat. The Tortoise, nearly half full of water, still staggered towards the shore under her foresail. Priscilla hauled at the rope of the centreboard.

"Run her up on the beach," she shouted. "If we do knock a hole in her it can't be helped. Oh glory, glory! look at that!"

One of the tents tore itself from its fastenings, flapped wildly in the air and then collapsed on the ground, a writhing heaving mass of soaked canvas. The Tortoise struck heavily on the shore. Priscilla leaped over her bows and ran up the beach with the anchor in her hand. She rammed one of its flukes deep into the gravel. Then she turned towards the boat and shouted:

"You help Frank out, Miss Rutherford. I must run on and see what's happening to those tents."

A young woman, rain soaked and dishevelled, knelt beside the fallen tent. She was working with fierce energy at the guy ropes, such of them as still clung to their pegs. They were hopelessly entangled with the others which had broken free and all of them were knotted and twisted round corners of the flapping canvas.

"If I were you," said Priscilla, "I'd leave those things alone till the storm blows over. You're only making them worse."

The young woman looked round at Priscilla and smoothed her blown wet hair from her face.

"Come and help me," she said, "please."

"What's the good of hurrying?" said Priscilla.

"My husband's underneath."

"Well, I suppose he's all right. In fact, I daresay he's a good deal drier there than we are outside. We'd far better go into your tent and wait."

"He'll smother."

"Not he. If he's suffering from anything this minute I should say it is draughts."

The canvas heaved convulsively. It was evident that some one underneath was making desperate efforts to get out.

"He's smothering. I know he is."

"Very well," said Priscilla. "I'll give you a help if you like; I don't know much about tents and I may simply make things worse. However, I'll try."

She attacked a complex tangle of ropes vigorously. Miss Rutherford, with Frank leaning on her shoulder, staggered up the beach. Just as they reached the tents the head of a young man appeared under the flapping canvas. Then his arms struggled out Priscilla seized him by the hands and pulled hard.

"Oh, Barnabas!" said the young lady, "are you safe?"

"He's wet," said Priscilla, "and rather muddy, but he's evidently alive and he doesn't look as if he was injured in any way."

The young man looked round him wildly at first He was evidently bewildered after his struggle with the tent and surprised at the manner of his rescue. He gradually realised that there were strangers present. His eyes rested on Miss Rutherford. She seemed the most responsible member of the party. He pulled himself together with an effort and addressed her in a tone of suave politeness which, under the circumstances, was very surprising.

"Perhaps," he said, "I ought to introduce myself. My name is Pennefather, Barnabas Pennefather. The Rev. Barnabas Pennefather. This is my wife, Lady Isabel Pennefather. I have a card somewhere."

He began to fumble in various packets.

"Never mind the card," said Priscilla. "We'll take your word for it."

"We," said Miss Rutherford, "are a rescue party. We've been in search of you for days. This is Priscilla. This is Frank. My own name is Martha Rutherford."

"A rescue party!" said Mr. Pennefather.

"Did mother send you after us?" said Lady Isabel. "If she did you may go away again. I won't go back."

"Quite the contrary," said Priscilla, "we're on your side."

"In fact," said Miss Rutherford, "we're here to save you from——"

"At first," said Priscilla, "we fancied you might be spies, German spies. Afterwards we found out you weren't. That often happens you know. Just as you think you're perfectly certain you're right, it turns out that you're quite wrong."

"Then you really were pursuing us," said Lady Isabel. "I always said you were, didn't I, Barnabas?"

"Is Lord Torrington here?" said Mr. Pennefather.

"Not exactly here," said Priscilla, "at least not yet But he will be soon. When we left home this morning he was fully bent on hunting you down and I rather think the police sergeant must have given him the tip about where you are."

"The police!" said Mr. Pennefather.

"I don't so much mind if it's only father," said Lady Isabel.

"You may not," said Priscilla. "But I expect Mr. Pennefather will. Lord Torrington is very fierce. In his rage and fury he sprained Frank's ankle. He might have broken it. In fact, the railway guard thought he had. I don't know what he'll do to you when he catches you."

"Does he know we're married," said Mr. Pennefather.

"Is mother with him?" said Lady Isabel.

"She is," said Priscilla. "But it's all right. Aunt Juliet will keep her in play. You can count on Aunt Juliet until she finds out that you're married—after that——— But it will be all right. We have come to conduct you to a place of safety."

"An inviolable sanctuary," said Miss Rutherford. "But we shall all have colds in the head before we get there if we don't do something to dry ourselves."

"Barnabas," said Lady Isabel, "do go and change your clothes. He fell into the sea the other day, and he is so liable to take cold."

"We saw him," said Priscilla. "Go and change your clothes, Mr. Pennefather. By the time you've done that Jimmy Kinsella will have arrived and you can be oflf at once with Miss Rutherford. The sooner we're all out of this the better. Though Lord Torrington doesn't look like a man who would come out in a thunder storm even to catch his daughter."

"Your black suit is in the hold-all in my tent," said Lady Isabel.

The Reverend Barnabas Pennefather disappeared into the tent which was still standing. Priscilla looked around her cheerfully.

"It's clearing up," she said. "There's quite a lot of blue sky to be seen over Rosnacree. We'll all dry soon."

She gathered the bottom of her skirt tight into her hands and wrung the water out of it.

"Where are you going to take him to?" she said to Miss Rutherford.

"Am I to take him?" said Miss Rutherford. "I didn't know that was part of the plan. I thought we were all going together to Inishbawn, the sanctuary."

"Didn't I tell you," said Priscilla. "We decided that you were to have charge of Barnabas for a few days until the trouble blows over a bit. You're to pretend that he's your husband. You don't mind, do you?"

"I'd much rather have Frank," said Miss Rutherford.

"What on earth would be the use of that?" said Priscilla.

"But, of course, I'll marry Barnabas with pleasure," said Miss Rutherford, "if it's really necessary and Lady Isabel doesn't object."

"I won't be separated from Barnabas," said Lady Isabel, "and I'm sure he'll never agree to leave me."

"All the same you'll have to," said Priscilla, "both of you. We can't pretend you're not married if you're going about together on Inishbawn."

"But I don't want to pretend I'm not married. I'm proud of what we've done."

"You'll sacrifice the respect and affection of Aunt Juliet," said Priscilla, "the moment it comes out that you're married. As long as she thinks you're out on your own defying the absurd conventions by which women are made into what she calls 'bedizened dolls for the amusement of the brutalised male sex,' she'll be all on your side. But once she thinks you've given up your economic independence she'll simply turn round and help Lady Torrington to hunt you down."

Mr. Pennefather emerged from the tent. He wore a black suit of clothes of strictly clerical cut and a collar which buttoned at the back of his neck. Except that he was barefooted and had not brushed his hair he would have been fit to attend a Church Conference. His self-respect was restored by his attire. He walked over to Frank, who was dripping on a stone, and handed him a visiting card. Frank read it.

"Reverend Barnabas Pennefather—St. Agatha's Clergy House—Grosvenor Street, W."

"I am the senior curate," he said. "The staff consists of five priests besides the vicar."

"They want to take you away from me," said Lady Isabel. "But you won't go, say you won't, Barnabas."

Mr. Pennefather took his place at his wife's side. He held her hand in his.

"Nothing on earth," he said, "can separate us now."

"Very well," said Priscilla. "You're rather ungrateful, both of you, considering all we're doing for you, and I don't think you're exactly polite to Miss Rutherford, however——"

"Don't mind about me," said Miss Rutherford. "I feel snubbed, of course, but I wasn't really keen on having him for a husband, even temporarily."

Mr. Pennefather looked at her with shocked surprise. A deep flush spread slowly over his face. His eyes blazed with righteous indignation.

"Woman——" he began.

"If you don't mind," said Priscilla, "I think we'll call you Barnabas. It's rather long, of course, and solemn. The natural thing would be to shorten it down to Barny, but that wouldn't suit you a bit. The rain's over now. I think I'll go down and bail out the Tortoise. Then we'll all start You people can be taking down the tent that's standing, and folding up the other one."

"Where are we going to?" said Mr. Pennefather.

"To a sanctuary," said Miss Rutherford, "an inviolable sanctuary. Priscilla has that written down on the cover of a jam pot, so there's no use arguing about it."

"She says we'll be safe," said Lady Isabel.

"I refuse to move," said Mr. Pennefather, "until I know where I'm going and why."

"You talk to him, Cousin Frank," said Priscilla. "I see Jimmy Kinsella coming round the corner in his boat and I really must bail out the Tortoise."

"If you don't move out of this pretty quick," said Frank to Mr. Pennefather, "Lord Torrington will have you to a dead cert."

"'And fast before her father's men," said Miss Rutherford, "'three days we fled together. And should they find us in this glen——'"

"Oh, Barnabas," said Lady Isabel, who knew Campbell's poem and anticipated the end of the quotation, "Oh, Barnabas, let's go, anywhere, anywhere."

"I never saw any man," said Frank, "in such a wax as Lord Torrington."

"I haven't met him myself," said Miss Rutherford, "but I expect that when he begins to speak he'll shock you even worse than I did."

"We don't mind Father," said Lady Isabel. "It's Mother."

"They're both on your track," said Frank.

Mr. Pennefather looked from one to another of the group around him. Then he turned slowly on his heel and began to roll up his tent. Lady Isabel and Miss Rutherford set to work to pack the camp equipage. Frank took off his coat and wrung the water out of it. Then he spread it on the ground and looked at it It was the coat worn by members of the First Eleven. He had won his right to it when he caught out the Uppingham captain in the long field. Now such triumphs and glories seemed incredibly remote. The voices of Priscilla and Jimmy Kinsella reached him from the shore. They were arguing hotly.

Frank looked at them and saw that they were both on their knees in the Tortoise scooping up water in tin dishes.

The bailing was finished at last The packing was nearly done. Priscilla walked up to the camp dragging Jimmy Kinsella with her by the collar of the coat.

"Barnabas," she said, "have you got a revolver?"

Mr. Pennefather looked up from a roll of blankets which he was strapping together.

"No," he said. "I don't carry revolvers."

"I think you ought to," said Priscilla. "I mean whenever you happen to be running away with the daughter of the First Lord of the War Office or any one like that. But, of course, being a clergyman may make a difference. It's awfully hard to know exactly what a clergyman ought to do when he's eloping. At the same time it's jolly awkward you're not having a revolver, for Jimmy Kinsella says he won't go to Inishbawn and we can't all fit in the Tortoise."

"Leave him to me," said Frank. "Just bring him over here, Priscilla, and I'll deal with him."

"I'll not take you to Inishbawn," said Jimmy.

Priscilla handed him over to Frank. It was a long time, more than two years, since Frank had acquired some reputation as a master of men in the form Room of Remove A.; but he retained a clear recollection of the methods he had employed. He seized Jimmy Kinsella's wrist and with a deft, rapid movement, twisted it round. Jimmy had not enjoyed the advantages of an English public school education. Torture of a refined kind was new to him. He uttered a shrill squeal.

"Will you go where you're told," said Frank, "or do you want more?"

"I dursn't take yez to Inishbawn," said Jimmy whimpering. "My da would beat me if I did."

Frank twisted his arm again.

"My da will cut the liver out of me," said Jimmy.

"Stop that," said Mr. Pennefather. "I cannot allow bullying."

"It's for your sake entirely that it's being done," said Priscilla. "You're the most ungrateful beast I ever met. It would serve you jolly well right if we left you here to have your own arm twisted by Lord Torrington."

Miss Rutherford was kneeling in front of a beautiful canteen, fitting aluminium plates and various articles of cutlery into the places prepared for them. She stood up and brandished a large carving fork.

"This," she said, "will be just as effective as a revolver. You take it, Frank, and sit close to him in the boat. The moment he stops rowing or tries to go in any direction except Inishbawn you——"

She made a vicious stab in the air and then handed the fork to Frank.

A quarter of an hour later the party started. Mr. Pennefather and Lady Isabel refused to be separated. Priscilla took them in the Tortoise. They sat side by side near the mast and held each other's hands. Priscilla, after one glance in their direction, looked resolutely past them for the rest of the voyage. Miss Rutherford sat in the bow of Jimmy Kinsella's boat. Jimmy sat amidships and rowed. Frank, with the carving fork poised for a thrust, sat in the stern. The wind, following the departed thunderstorm, blew from the east. Priscilla set sail on the Tortoise. Jimmy hoisted his lug, but was obliged to row as well as sail in order to keep in touch with his consort. The boats grounded almost together on the shingly beach of Inishbawn.

Joseph Antony, who had made his way home through the thunderstorm, put his hand on the bow of the Tortoise.

"It'll be better for you not to land," he said.

"I know all about that," said Priscilla. "You needn't bother to invent anything fresh."

"You can't land here," said Joseph Antony. "Aren't there islands enough in the bay? Jimmy, will you push that boat off from the shore and take the lady and gentleman that's in her away out of this."

The carving fork descended an inch towards Jimmy's leg. His father menaced him with a threatening scowl. Jimmy sat quite still. Like the leader of the House of Lords during the last stage of a recent political crisis, he had ceased to be a free agent.

"I don't want to land on your beastly island," said Priscilla. "If there wasn't as much as a half-tide rock in the whole bay that I could put my foot on I wouldn't land here, and you can tell your wife from me that if that baby of hers was to die for the want of a bit of flannel, I won't steal another scrap from Aunt Juliet's box to give it to her."

"Sure you know well enough, Miss," said Joseph Antony, "that there's ne'er a one would be more welcome to the island than yourself. But the way things is at present——"

"I've a pretty good guess at the way things are," said Priscilla, "and the minute I get back tonight I'm going to tell Sergeant Rafferty."

Joseph Antony smiled uneasily.

"You wouldn't do the like of that," he said.

"I will," said Priscilla, "unless you allow me to land these two at once."

Joseph Antony looked long and carefully at Mr. Pennefather.

"What about the other young gentleman?" he said, "the one that has the sore leg?"

"He doesn't want to set foot on Inishbawn," said Priscilla.

"And the young lady," said Joseph Antony, "that does be taking the water in the little boat along with Jimmy?"

"She'll let Jimmy row her off to any corner of the bay you like," said Priscilla, "if you'll allow the other two to land."

Joseph Antony looked at Mr. Pennefather again.

"I wouldn't say there was much harm in him," he said.

"There's none," said Priscilla, "absolutely none. Isn't he paying L4 a week for that old boat of Flanagan's. Doesn't that show you the kind of man he is?"

"Unless," said Joseph Antony, "it could be that he's signed the pledge for life."

"Have you signed the pledge for life, Barnabas?" said Priscilla. "Let go of her hand for one minute and answer the question that's asked you."

"Does he mean a temperance pledge?" said Mr. Pennefather.

"I do," said Joseph Antony. "Are you a member of the Total Abstinence Sodality?"

"I take a little whisky after my work on Sunday evenings," said Mr. Pennefather, "and, of course, when I'm dining out I——"

"That'll do," said Joseph Antony. "A man that takes it one time will take it another. I suppose now you're not any ways connected with the police?"

"He is not," said Priscilla. "Can't you see he's a clergyman?"

"It's beyond me," said Joseph Antony, "what brings you to Inishbawn at all."

"The way things are with you at present," said Priscilla, "it wouldn't be a bad thing to have a clergyman staying with you on the island. It would look respectable."

"It would, of course," said Joseph Antony.

"If any question ever came to be asked," said Priscilla, "about what's going on here, it would be a grand thing for you to be able to say that you had the Rev. Barnabas Pennefather stopping along with you."

"It would surely," said Joseph Antony.

Priscilla jumped out of the boat and drew Kinsella a little way up the beach.

"If anything was to come out," she whispered, "you could say that it was the strange clergyman and that you didn't know what was going on."

"I might," said Joseph Antony.

Priscilla turned to the boat joyfully.

"Hop out, Barnabas," she shouted, "and take the tents and things with you. It's all settled. Joseph Antony will give you the run of his island and you'll be perfectly safe."

Mr. Pennefather climbed over the bows of the Tortoise.

Lady Isabel tugged at the hold-all, which was tucked away under a thwart and heaved it with a great effort into her husband's arms. He staggered under the weight of it. Joseph Antony Kinsella's instinctive politeness asserted itself.

"Will you let me take that from you?" he said. "The like of them parcels isn't fit for your reverence to carry."

Lady Isabel got the rest of her luggage out of the Tortoise. Then she and Mr. Pennefather went to Jimmy Kinsella's boat and unloaded it. They had a good deal of luggage altogether. When everything was stacked on the beach Mrs. Kinsella, with her baby in her arms, came down and looked at the pile with amazement. Three small, bare-legged Kinsellas, young brothers of Jimmy's, followed her. She turned to Priscilla.

"Maybe now," she said, "them ones is after being evicted? Tell me this, was it out of shops or off the land that they did be getting their living before the trouble came on them?"

"Arrah, whist, woman," said Joseph Antony, "have you no eyes in your head. Can't you see that the gentleman's a clergyman?"

"Glory be to God!" said Mrs. Kinsella, "and to think now that they'd evict the like of him!"

Lady Isabel held out her hand to Priscilla.

"Goodbye," she said, "and thank you so much for all you've done. If you see my mother——"

"We'll see her tonight," said Priscilla. "I shan't be let in to dinner, but I'll see her afterwards when Aunt Juliet is smoking in the hope of shocking your father."

"Don't tell her we're here," said Lady Isabel.

"Come along, Frank," said Priscilla. "I'll help you out of that boat and into the Tortoise. We must be getting home. Goodbye, Miss Rutherford."

"It really is goodbye this time," said Miss Rutherford. "I'm off tomorrow morning."

"Back to London?" said Frank. "Hard luck."

"To that frowsy old Museum," said Priscilla, "full of skeletons of whales and stuffed antelopes and things."

"I feel it all acutely," said Miss Rutherford. "Don't make it worse for me by enumerating my miseries."

"And I don't believe you've caught a single sponge," said Priscilla. "Will they be frightfully angry with you?"

"I've got a few," said Miss Rutherford, "fresh water ones that I caught before I met you. I'll make the most of them."

"Anyhow," said Priscilla, "it'll be a great comfort to you to feel that you've taken part in a noble deed of mercy before you left."

"That's something, of course," said Miss Rutherford, "but you can't think how annoying it is to have to go away just at this crisis of the adventure. I shall be longing day and night to hear how it ends."

"I'll write and tell you, if you like," said Priscilla.

"Do," said Miss Rutherford. "Just let me know whether the sanctuary remains inviolable and I shall be satisfied."

"Right," said Priscilla. "Goodbye We needn't actually kiss each other, need we? Of course, if you want to frightfully you can; but I think kissing's rather piffle."

Miss Rutherford contented herself with wringing Priscilla's hand. Then she and Priscilla helped Frank out of Jimmy Kinsella's boat and into the Tortoise.

The wind was due east and was blowing a good deal harder than it was when they ran down to Inish-bawn. The Tortoise had a long beat before her, the kind of beat which means that a small boat will take in a good deal of water. Priscilla passed an oilskin coat to Frank. Having been wet through by the thunderstorm and having got dry, Frank had no wish to get wet again. He struggled into the coat, pushing his arms through sleeves which stuck together and buttoned it round him. The Tortoise settled down to her work in earnest She listed over until the foaming dark water rushed along her gunwale. She pounded into the short seas, lifted her bow clear of them, pounded down again, breasted them, took them fair on the curve of her bow, deluged herself, Frank's oilskin and even the greater part of her sails with showers of spray. The breeze freshened and at the end of each tack the boat swung round so fast that Frank, with his maimed ankle, had hard work to scramble over the centreboard case to the weather side. He slipped and slithered on the wet floor boards. There was a wash of water on the lee side which caught and soaked whichever leg he left behind him. He discovered that an oilskin coat is a miserably inefficient protection in a small boat. Not that the seas came through it. That does not happen. But while he made a grab at the flying foresail sheet a green blob of a wave would rush up his sleeve and soak him elbow high. Or, when he had turned his back to the wind and settled down comfortably, an insidious shower of spray found means to get between his coat and his neck, and trickled swiftly down, saturating his innermost garments to his very waist. Also it is necessary sometimes to squat with knees bent chinward, and then there are bulging spaces between the buttons of the coat Seas, leaping joyfully clear of the weather bow, came plump into his lap. It became a subject of interesting speculation whether there was a square inch of his body left dry anywhere.

Priscilla, who had no oilskin, got wet quicker but was no wetter in the end. Her cotton frock clung to her. Water oozed out of the tops of her shoes as she pressed her feet against the lee side of the boat to maintain her position on the slippery floor boards. She had crammed her hat under the stern thwart. Her hair, glistening with salt water, blew in tangles round her head. Her face glowed with excitement. She was enjoying herself to the utmost.

Tack after tack brought them further up the bay. The wind was still freshening, but the sea, as they got nearer the eastern shore, became calmer. The Tortoise raced through it. Sharp squalls struck her occasionally. She dipped her lee gunwale and took a lump of solid water on board. Priscilla luffed her and let the main sheet run through her fingers. The Tortoise bounced up on even keel and shook her sails in an ill-tempered way. Priscilla, with a pull at the tiller, set her on her course again. A few minutes later the sea whitened and frothed to windward and the same process was gone through again. The stone perch was passed. The tacks became shorter, and the squalls, as the wind descended from the hills, were more frequent.

But the sail ended triumphantly. Never before had Priscilla rounded up the Tortoise to her mooring buoy with such absolute precision. Never before had she so large an audience to witness her skill. Peter Walsh was waiting for her at the buoy in Bran-nigan's punt. Patsy the smith, quite sober but still yellow in the face, was standing on the slip. On the edge of the quay, having torn themselves from their favourite seat, were all the loafers who usually occupied Brannigan's window sills. Timothy Sweeny had come down from his shop and stood in the background, a paunchy, flabby figure of a man, with keen beady eyes.

"The weather's broke, Miss," said Peter Walsh, as he rowed them ashore. "The wind will work round to the southeast and your sailing's done for this turn."

"It may not," said Priscilla, stepping from the punt to the slip, "you can't be sure about the wind."