Land

by Liam O'Flaherty

  Fenton stared at her in silence for a long time after she had finished speaking. Barbara returned his stare. Although the smile of triumph still played about the corners of her mouth, there were now vertical lines in her forehead and her eyes had narrowed as if in anger.

  She touched the sofa beside her with her palm.

  “Sit down, Jim,” she said softly.

  Fenton sighed and walked slowly across the floor towards the cupboard that stood in the corner between the window and the door. He dropped the boots casually to the floor on the way across. He opened the cupboard and took out his whisky bottle.

  “What are you doing, Jim?” Barbara said, getting to her feet.

  Fenton uncorked the bottle and said:

  “I should have known.”

  “What should you have known?” Barbara said in an anxious tone.

  Fenton took a tumbler from the cupboard and poured whisky into it. When the tumbler was more than half full, he put the bottle down slowly.

  “This is my first drink since that day,” he said.

  He put the tumbler to his lips and drank until it was empty. Then he poured more whisky from the bottle.

  “What should you have known?” Barbara repeated as she undid the remaining buttons of her tunic. “I insist on your telling me.”

  Fenton took his glass and came towards her. He halted when he was halfway. He clicked his heels and tried to stand erect. The whisky had apparently gone to his head at once. He swayed back and forth.

  “I should have known,” he said slowly, “that a man does not become ennobled by dishonour.”

  Barbara took off her tunic hurriedly and threw it on the sofa. She began to undo her blouse.

  “Quite the contrary is true,” Fenton said, raising his voice. “Dishonour leaves a stain that can never be washed out. After the first step in the wrong direction, it is impossible to regain lost honour. It seems that there is no turning back, once that first step has been taken. One must go on from one infamy to another. One makes excuses and one tries to justify oneself, but it is an illusion and a sham. That day I was full of illusions. I walked among the stars. Now reality comes to uncover the falsehood of my pretenses. I used to think that it was in your husband’s room I took the first step, when he proposed to make me his accomplice in a murder that he planned. The truth is that I had taken the first step a long time before that. I took it when I first surrendered in thought to my love for you.”

  He threw back his head and cried out in an agonised voice:

  “What do you want me to do? Did you come here because you want my help to steal that money, just as Neville needed the documents I had?”

  “That is not true,” Barbara said as she took off her blouse. “I came here because I want to give proof of my love. I’m going to give you proof, Jim, full proof.”

  “You lie,” Fenton said. “I know now why the groom became a drunkard and why he returned. You ruined him, too. Perhaps even Neville …”

  He interrupted himself as she threw the blouse to the floor and stretched out of her arms towards him. A flimsy silk chemise, frilled with black lace, was all that now screened the tawny beauty of her virgin breasts. He threw away his glass and rushed to her.

  “My love! My darling love!” he muttered hoarsely.

  “It is you I want, Jim,” Barbara cried exultantly as they sank to the sofa in one another’s arms. “You and you only. I’ll give you proof of my love.”

  Made faint by the intensity of his passion, he laid his cheek against her bosom and closed his eyes.

  “I’ll make you forget all of this unhappiness,” she said tenderly as she stroked his hair. “Be calm and don’t worry any more. Later, you will realise how paltry these things are. A happy man has no conscience, Jim, and I’m going to make you very happy. I promise you that. I have everything planned. You have nothing to do but ride with me to Galway when I give the signal. We are going to Texas on an American ship. Then we’ll take horses and ride out on to the plains, as free as birds. Our life is going to be wild and free and beautiful. It’s going to be a dance of love.”

  Even though Fenton still knew that he was doomed, he listened in rapture to her wanton whispering.

  Chapter XXXI

  Elizabeth was in bed, recovering from a heavy cold she had caught while collecting used clothes in the village for the Relief Committee. Wearing a thick woollen jacket and with a knitted scarf wound several times around her throat, she sat propped up against pillows. Her little thin face, framed by a tasselled white night-bonnet; looked excited in spite of her depressing ailment. The collected clothes, all washed and ironed by now, lay neatly piled on a table by the side of the bed. She was mending the last of the garments.

  Lettice came into the room just as the big clock in the hall downstairs began to strike the hour. She was closely followed by Tim Ahearn, who carried a large wicker basket.

  “Good heavens! Lettice,” Elizabeth cried in surprise, “it’s noon already. I had no idea it was that late.”

  “Put it down here, Tim,” Lettice said.

  Ahearn laid the basket on the floor beside the table. Then he looked at Elizabeth reproachfully.

  “I’ve had the horse harnessed for the last half-hour,” he said, “waiting to take those old rags to Clash for you.”

  “What impertinence!” cried Elizabeth indignantly. “Old rags, indeed! It’s outrageous. You’ve become insufferable since my brother went to jail.”

  “I never thought I’d live to see the day, Miss Elizabeth,” Ahearn said mournfully, “when you’d be gathering old clothes in the village like any poor wandering rag-man.”

  “You idiot!” cried Elizabeth. “You utterly stupid man! Don’t you understand that these clothes are for needy victims of the struggle against the landlords? Now that winter has come, the people on the Relief Committee are clamouring for supplies, to be distributed at once.”

  “Don’t excite yourself,” Lettice said to her aunt.

  She turned to Ahearn and added:

  “I’ll call you when the hamper is ready, Tim.”

  Ahearn halted as he was going out the door and looked back over his shoulder at Elizabeth.

  “It’s little thanks you’ll get,” he said to her, “from these people that are pretending to be needy. They’ll just laugh at you up their sleeves. More than likely, they’ll pawn whatever is given to them and drink the price.”

  “Oh! That frightful man!” cried Elizabeth after the door had closed behind Ahearn. “He’s furious at being kept waiting. He’s in a hurry to get drunk at Clash. Since Raoul went away, he has reverted to all his bad habits.”

  “Poor Tim!” Lettice said as she began to pack the clothes into the basket. “My father has been too hard on him.”

  “Next thing you know,” Elizabeth added, “he’ll move back into the settle-bed from the attic. He keeps complaining about having to sleep in a clean bed.”

  “One must understand,” Lettice said, “that his periodic tipples are the only exciting moments in his life. He’s really not a drunkard. One small measure of rum intoxicates him. He told me that he drinks when his loneliness becomes too much for him to bear. ‘The loneliness of the great world,’ he called it. He has a beautiful soul. It would be very difficult to find a man with a finer conception of loyalty.”

  Elizabeth was shamefaced as she continued her mending.

  “Forgive me,” she said in a contrite tone. “I’m far too intolerant of other people’s faults. Even though I’ve learned from you how to love the people in general, I’m still too selfish to love them individually.”

  “You are being very unjust to yourself, dear Aunt,” Lettice said with feeling. “The truth is that you have spent your whole life working devotedly for others, without reward of any sort.”

  “That’s not so,” Elizabeth said. “Whatever I did was through a sense of duty. That’s not enough. It breeds self-righteousness. Only what comes straight from the heart is really beautiful. That is why great sin
ners are often so lovable. Whatever they do, whether good or evil, comes right from their hearts.”

  Tears came into her eyes and she looked at Lettice tenderly.

  “Oh! I’m so grateful to you,” she continued, “for all you have given me, since you came into the house. God grant I may be able to repay you for your great bounty.”

  Lettice came over to the bed and laid her hand gently against her aunt’s forehead.

  “Try to compose yourself now,” she whispered. “I shouldn’t have let you do all that mending.”

  Elizabeth took her niece’s hand and pressed it to her lips. Tears were rolling down her thin cheeks.

  “You are an angel of love,” she whispered.

  “Hush!” Lettice said. “Be quiet for a little while. I’ll finish mending that jacket.”

  Like a child that fears a toy is going to be taken from it, Elizabeth clutched the jacket and her sewing needle.

  “No, no,” she cried. “Let me finish it. I want to do it myself. I insist. There are only a few more stitches. Then I’ll be quiet. I promise you.”

  “Very well,” Lettice said, returning to the basket.

  Although it was very cold outside, with a blustering wind, a blazing turf fire in the grate made the room cosy and bright. Now and again, the naked tops of four young trees came into view beyond the window, as they bowed down slowly before the rush of the wind. Heavy waves crashed on to the beach at regular intervals. Seagulls cackled in harsh chorus as they soared over the house.

  “There now,” Elizabeth said after a long silence, as she put down the mended jacket. “I’ve finished.”

  Lettice continued to pack the clothes without seeming to have heard her aunt’s remarks. Her face looked very stern.

  “Did I hear somebody come riding up the drive a little while ago?” said Elizabeth after another silence.

  Lettice raised her head slowly and looked out the window.

  “Father Costigan called,” she said solemnly.

  “The cheek of him!” said Elizabeth angrily. “He must be entirely devoid of all decent feeling. Otherwise he would never dream of coming here, after what he did to Raoul.”

  Lettice put the last of the clothes into the basket, fastened the lid and went out on to the landing to call Ahearn.

  “You may come up now, Tim,” she said. “Ask Annie to come with you. The hamper is rather heavy.”

  Then she went to the window and looked out over the sea. The foam-capped waves rolled on and on before the wind, in endless march. On the far horizon a black cloud hung low above the water. Rain was falling out there.

  “What did Father Cornelius want?” Elizabeth said.

  “He came to talk about Michael,” Lettice said.

  The two servants entered. Elizabeth gave Ahearn instructions about delivering the hamper of clothes. This time he curtsied to her respectfully without speaking. Then the two of them picked up the basket and walked out of the room on tip-toe.

  “Did he have any news?” Elizabeth said eagerly as the servants began to descend the stairs.

  “Not of Michael,” Lettice said, turning away from the window.

  “Oh! How I wish I could take your sorrow from you!” Elizabeth cried with fervour as Lettice walked slowly towards the fireplace. “It is unjust that one so deserving of happiness as you are should be …”

  Lettice halted suddenly by the foot of the bed, thrust out her chin haughtily and said:

  “Thank you for your kind intention, dear Aunt, but I assure you that I feel no sorrow.”

  Elizabeth looked very hurt.

  “Upon my word!” she said. “Sometimes you behave and speak exactly like your father.”

  “Forgive me,” Lettice said as she moved again towards the fireplace.

  Her carriage had lost its girlish exuberance. It now had the solemn dignity of mature womanhood.

  “You’d be the most heartless of all creatures,” Elizabeth continued in a passionate tone, “if you didn’t feel sorrow when your husband is being hunted night and day like a wild animal.”

  Lettice sat on a low stool by the fire and clasped her hands over her knees. Her hair looked dark red against the pale flames that rose from the burning turf.

  “I suffer, but I feel no sorrow,” she said.

  “What is the difference?” said Elizabeth. “What is the use of splitting hairs like that?”

  “One feels sorrow when something is lost,” Lettice said, “or because of a pain that one bears against one’s will.”

  “I insist that you are splitting hairs,” said Elizabeth. “I find that foolish and utterly useless. It would do you more good to pour ashes on your head and wail for all the world to hear your woe, like the wise women of the people do.”

  “Why should I grieve for him?” Lettice said. “He is now living in the way he wants to live. He finds beauty only in danger. I suffer because I’m parted from him. That is all.”

  Elizabeth leaned forward and stared intently at her niece for a little while. She had ceased to be irritated. Her eyes again looked tender.

  “So you have heard nothing from him yet,” she said at length.

  “No,” said Lettice.

  “Not a single word since he went away that afternoon,” Elizabeth said.

  “I didn’t expect to hear from him,” Lettice said calmly. “How cruel men are!” said Elizabeth.

  “He is not being cruel,” said Lettice. “It’s just that we had already said farewell.”

  “What do you mean?” said Elizabeth.

  “It was after the storm,” said Lettice.

  Elizabeth leaned back slowly against the pillows and said:

  “Tell me about it, child.”

  “It was on the fifth day of our honeymoon,” Lettice said gently, as she stared into the fire. “We had been wonderfully happy for four days on the tiny island to which he brought me in a pucaun. It was a naked rock, sitting alone on the sea, many miles from any other land. There were only thousands of large white birds, a strip of sand on which we beached our boat and a thatched hut once used by smugglers. The hut was perched on the very summit of the island, two hundred feet above the water. Michael’s comrades had repaired it for our visit. It was Indian summer for the first four days. Michael told me that the island fishermen call it ‘blue weather’ and that it was held sacred in ancient times to Ængus, the God of Love. Until quite recently, he said, mystical rites were performed in secret during ‘blue weather’ at many places along the coast. It’s not at all strange that people should worship such beauty. It truly had a divine quality. Everything was coloured an enchanting blue. The sea was transparent down to the very bed of the ocean. Each morning at sunrise, when we swam out side by side through the smooth blue water, we sang for joy. In the evenings, we sat outside our hut and built castles in the air, even though we already knew what the future held in store for our love. It was easy to forget and to make believe up there beneath the purple vault of Heaven and its myriad stars. On the morning of the fifth day, we rose to find that the ‘blue weather’ had vanished in the night. The sky had turned grey. There was a light breeze. Michael stood watching the sea for a long time in silence. He had been very gay, like a little boy on holiday, since our arrival at the island. Now his face was stark, as it had been when I saw him first, staggering into the kitchen. Dark balls of cloud appeared on the horizon, like puffs of smoke from guns that have just been fired. He turned to me and took my hands and stared at me steadily, without smiling or speaking. He kept pressing my hands. His own hands trembled. Finally he suggested that we go sailing. I was surprised and said to him: ‘Surely, it looks as if a storm were coming.’ He smiled and said: ‘Would you be afraid to sail with me through a storm?’ I told him that I would not be afraid. He then became excited and kissed me several times. ‘I have a reason for asking you to sail with me,’ he said. ‘I’ll tell you what it is afterwards.’ So we put the boat into the sea and hoisted the sail. When we cleared the mouth of the little cove, he gave full scop
e to the sail and we raced before the wind, which was already blowing strongly. The pucaun began to leap the rising waves like a hare going through long grass. We sailed ahead for more than an hour. By then it blew a hurricane. The waves came towering after us, always threatening to smother us and yet missing us by a hair’s breadth. Then Michael shouted into my ear: ‘We are now going to fight the storm.’ He lashed me to the stern and we raced on for a little while longer. He suddenly put about. I felt certain that we had foundered, because a giant wave passed right over me. I was nearly carried overboard, in spite of the stout rope with which I was tied. I lay breathless and unable to see for several minutes. When I recovered, however, I saw that we were still on an even keel, with our bow into the teeth of the wind. Michael grinned at me and we clasped hands. At once I felt a greater joy than I had ever known before. He had opened the innermost door and allowed me to enter. Then I understood what he had really meant when he said that Cape Horn was beautiful. I understood why beauty could be found in danger and why rapture could be dark as well as bright. We fought the hurricane for six hours, trying to push our tiny craft ahead in spite of the savage power pitted against it. During every moment of that time we treaded the brink of death. He gave me the tiller to hold several times, for a few moments, while he looked to the sail. That was very beautiful. Towards sunset, the hurricane had spent itself, but there was still a heavy sea. We couldn’t return to our island, so we made for Grealish. We were entering the roadstead when he took me in his arms and whispered: ‘Later on, when it’s time for me to go, remember that we have said farewell. This is our farewell. Promise me now that there will be no other.’ I promised him.”