Priscilla's Spies Part 13

"I don't rightly know the name of it; but sure my ma is covered thick with yellow spots the size of a sixpence or bigger; and the young lads is worse. The cries of them at night would make you turn round on your bed pitying them."

"Do you expect me to believe all that?" said Priscilla.

"Three times my da was in for the doctor," said Jimmy, "and the third time he fetched out a powerful fine bottle that he bought in Brannigan's, but it was no more use to them than water. Is it likely now that he'd allow a strange lady and a gentleman to come to the island, and them not knowing? He wouldn't do it for a hundred pounds."

"If you're going on talking that kind of way there's not much use my asking you any more questions. But I'd like very much to know where those camping people are now."

"I shouldn't wonder," said Jimmy, "but they're drowned. The planks of that old boat of Flanagan's is opened so as you could see the daylight in between every one of them, and it would take a man with a can to be bailing the whole time you'd be going anywhere in her; let alone that the gentleman??"

"I know what the gentleman is in a boat," said Priscilla.

"And herself is no better. It was only this morning my ma was saying to me that it's wonderful the little sense them ones has."

"I thought," said Priscilla, "that your mother was out all over yellow spots. What does she know about them?"

Jimmy Kinsella grinned sheepishly.

"Believe you me, Miss," he said, "if it was only yourself that was in it??"

"There'd be neither rats nor fever on the island, I suppose."

Jimmy looked towards the _Tortoise_ and let his eyes rest with an inquiring expression on Frank Mannix.

"That gentleman's ankle is sprained," said Priscilla, "so whatever it is that you have on your island, you needn't be afraid of him."

"That might be," said Jimmy.

"You can tell your father from me," said Priscilla, "that the next time I'm out this way I'll land on Inish-bawn and see for myself what it is that has you all telling lies."

"Any time you come, Miss, you'll be welcome. It's a poor place we have, surely, but it would be a queer thing if we wouldn't give you the best of what might be going. But I don't know how it is. There's a powerful lot of strangers knocking around, people that might be decent or might not."

His eyes were still fixed on Frank Mannix when Priscilla left him.

The tide was flowing strongly and the water began to cover the lower parts of the bank. Priscilla measured with her eye the distance between the _Tortoise_ and the sea. She calculated that she might get off in about an hour.

When she reached the _Tortoise_ she found Frank pressing the last half peach on their guest.

"Miss Rutherford," said Priscilla, "have you landed on Inishbawn, that island to the west of you, behind the corner of Illaunglos?"

"No," she said. "I wanted to, but the boy who's rowing me strongly advised me not to."

"Rats?" Said Priscilla, "or fever?"

Miss Rutherford seemed puzzled by the inquiry.

"What I mean," said Priscilla, "is this: did he give you any reason for not landing on the island?"

"As well as I recollect," said Miss Rutherford, "he said something to the effect that it wasn't a suitable island for ladies. I didn't take much notice of what he said, for it didn't matter to me where I landed.

One of the islands is the same thing as another. In fact Inishbawn, if that's its name, doesn't look a very good place for sponges."

"Oh, you still stick to those sponges?" said Priscilla.

"Miss Rutherford," said Frank, "is collecting zoophytes for the British Museum."

"Investigating and tabulating," said Miss Rutherford, "for the Royal Dublin Society's Natural History Survey."

"I took up elementary science last term," said Priscilla, "but we didn't do about those things of yours. I daresay we'll get on to them next year. If we do I'll write to you for the names of some of the rarer kinds and score off Miss Pennycolt with them. She's the science teacher, and she thinks she knows a lot. It'll do her good to be made to look small over a sponge that she's never seen before, or even heard of."

"I'll send them to you," said Miss Rutherford. "I take the greatest delight in scoring off science teachers everywhere. I was taught science myself at one time and I know exactly what it's like."

Jimmy Kinsella sat on a stone with his back to the party in the _Tortoise_. An instinct for good manners is the natural inheritance of all Irishmen. The peasant has it as surely as the peer, generally indeed more surely, for the peer, having mixed more with men of other nations, loses something of his natural delicacy of feeling. When, as in the case of young Kinsella, the Irishman has much to do with the sea his courtesy reaches a high degree of refinement As the advancing tide crept inch by inch over the mudbank Jimmy Kinsella was forced back towards the _Tortoise_. He moved from stone to stone, dragging his boat after him as the water floated her. Never once did he look round or make any attempt to attract the attention of Miss Rutherford. He would no doubt have retreated uncomplaining to the highest point of the bank and sat there till the water reached his waist, clinging to the painter of the boat, rather than disturb the conversation of the lady whom he had taken under his care. But his courtesy was put to no such extreme test He made a move at last which brought him within a few feet of the _Tortoise_. A mere patch of sea-soaked mud remained uncovered. The water, advancing from the far side of the bank, already lapped against the bows of the _Tortoise_. Miss Rutherford woke up to the fact that the time for catching sponges was past.

"I'm afraid," she said, "that I ought to be getting home. I can't tell you how much obliged to you I am for feeding me. I believe I should have fainted if it hadn't been for that tongue."

"It was a pleasure to us," said Priscilla. "We'd eaten all we could before you came."

"I'm afraid," said Frank politely, "that it wasn't very nice. We ought to have had knives and forks or at least a tumbler to drink out of. I don't know what you must think of us."

"Think of you!" said Miss Rutherford. "I think you're the two nicest children I ever met."

She stumped off and joined Jimmy Kinsella. Priscilla saw her putting on her shoes and stockings as the boat rowed away. She shouted a farewell.

Miss Rutherford waved a stocking in reply.

"There," said Priscilla, turning to Frank, "what do you think of that?

The two nicest children! I don't mind of course; but I do call it rather rough on you after talking so grand and having on your best first eleven coat and all."

CHAPTER IX

Frank learned several things while the sails were being hoisted. The word halyard became familiar to him and connected itself definitely with certain ropes. He discovered that a sheet is, oddly enough, not an expanse of canvas, but another rope. He impressed carefully on his mind the part of the boat in which he might, under favourable circ.u.mstances, expect to find the centreboard tackle.

The wind, which had dropped completely at low water, sprang up again, this time from the west, with the rising tide. This was pleasant and promised a fair run home, but Priscilla eyed the sky suspiciously. She was weather-wise.

"It'll die clean away," she said, "towards evening. It always does on this kind of day when it has worked round with the sun. Curious things winds are, Cousin Frank, aren't they? Rather like ices in some ways, I always think."

Frank had considerable experience of ices, and had been obliged, while playing various games, to take some notice of the wind from time to time; but he missed the point of Priscilla's comparison. She explained herself.

"If you put in a good spoonful at once," she said, "it gives you a pain in some tooth or other and you don't enjoy it. On the other hand, if you put in a very little bit it gets melted away before you're able to taste it properly. That's just the way the wind behaves when you're out sailing. Either it has you clinging on to the main sheet for all you're worth or else it dies away and leaves you flapping. It's only about once a month that you get just what you want."

It seemed to Frank, when the boat got under way, that they had happened on the one propitious day. The _Tortoise_ slipped pleasantly along, her sails well filled, the boom pressed forward against the shroud, the main sheet an attenuated coil at Priscilla's feet.

"I'm feeling a bit bothered," said Priscilla.

"We ought to have been back for luncheon," said Frank. "I know that."

"It's not luncheon that's bothering me; although it's quite likely that we won't be back for dinner either. What I can't quite make up my mind about is what we ought to do next about those spies."